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darkficsyouneveraskedfor · 4 years ago

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Secrets ~ 1

Warnings: noncon sexual acts later in series

This is dark!Bucky and dark!Steve and explicit. Your media consumption is your own responsibility. Warnings have been given. DO NOT PROCEED if these matters upset you.

Summary: A buried family secret comes to light thrusting you to the forefront of an old alliance.

Note: Bruh, other series are still going. At least one update a week for existing series in future, I promise! Probably more.

This was semi-inspired by The Princess Diaries but obviously we’re not going highschool.

Thank you. Love you guys!

As always, if you can, please leave some feedback, like and reblog <3

You found it hard to focus on the lecture. You copied the slides without processing the words. You couldn’t tear your mind from the unusual stranger. The one who had slipped from the room not ten minutes earlier. The one no one else seemed to notice; even the professor as she outlined the fall of the Roman Empire.

You did because you were early every week. You sat in the same seat, pulled out your notebook and pen, and put your phone on silent. You’d worked too long to screw this up. Years of saving and scrounging just to pay the application fee, bursaries awarded for your volunteer work and nearly forgotten extracurriculars from high school.

So, you noticed. The man sat in the back row with not a possession before him. Silent, discerning, and to be frank, a bit too old for the student body. Even you, after several years away from academics, thought so. You used the reflection in your phone screen to watch him and when he stood and left without cause, you angled it after his departure.

Perhaps he had come to the wrong room. Or maybe he had got the wrong time. He could be an older student or a guest speaker. Whatever he was, he was gone and you needed to focus. You didn’t have much time outside of class to revise your notes. Between your job at the campus bookstore and your intern position at the museum, you didn’t have time for anything beyond a few hours sleep.

You packed up as the lecture came to an end. Tuesdays, Professor Halren went over the week’s material and Thursdays you had a class discussion on the assigned articles. Basic, simple, but at least eighty pages of reading a week. You climbed the steps between the rows of tables and passed through the upper doors. The east entrance down the rear stairwell was the quickest exit.

You tossed your bag in the passenger seat of your crummy used Honda, parked in front of the burger joint several blocks away from campus parking. It cost you more to park on-site than it did for the beat-up contraption itself.

You drove to the museum and got out, your lanyard around your neck denoting you as a volunteer. You usually worked the help desk or handed out pamphlets for upcoming tours. Most of the time it was quiet enough for you to study in between visitors.

Sheila was the curator on duty that night. She kept to her office, saying she trusted you to direct the rare patrons who arrived on a Tuesday night. As expected, it was dead. You wandered around with textbook in hand, occasionally looking up to check that you were alone.

There was a man by the chart of Greek gods and their relations. A spiderweb with no end. You closed your book and quietly set it down on the nearest bench as you kept an eye on the man. It was him, the one from the lecture hall. A frightening coincidence. He leaned closer to the diagram then turned away, walking, no marching along the wall and rounding the corner into the next section.

Your heart was beating; in confusion and fear. You followed, carefully not to let your shoes click as you did. As you reached the next corridor, he was nowhere to be seen. You continued on, around corner and corner, on and on, looking up and down the walkways. He was gone.

You came back to the bench where you left your textbook. You glanced around one last time and opened it. Behind the cover was a ribbon, a tricade of red, white, and blue, a star emblazoned three-quarters of the way up embroidered in gold and silver. You’d seen it before but none so new as this.

You held it up and felt it between your fingers. You closed the book again and tucked it under your arm. You went to the next wing; medieval history. You walked along the timeline of European kingdoms, below each was a display of royal families of each.

The same ribbon, aged and frayed, laid beneath the kingdom of Astrania, marked by the house of Rogers. A long storied bloodline thrust in and out of power by civil wars and politics well into the twentieth century. A country that stood still, one of the few who still lauded a monarch, as famous as the Windsors in England and beyond. The last vestiges of long lost era.

You shoved the ribbon in your pocket. It was likely a souvenir from some commodified tour of the country. A forgotten novelty sold for pennies and shoved into a used textbook. You shrugged and headed back to your usual spot among the ancient civilizations. Strange things happened. That was life.

👑

You spent your few hours before midnight writing up your rough draft for Life and Death in Ancient Greece then finally crashed. You slept on your back, uncomfortably; a heavy, exhausted sleep. You woke to voices. Your mother’s and another. One you didn’t know.

You checked the time, it was barely seven in the morning. You grumbled as you sat up. Your mother’s tone set you on edge as her voice rose. You stood and crossed to the door. You turned the handle slowly, listening through the crack of the door as you eased it open.

“You get out of my house.” She snarled. You’d never heard her sound so vicious. “I am not that person anymore. I never was.”

“You can hide behind a name,” The deep voice replied evenly. “It doesn’t change your real one.”

“My father is dead, his name died with him.” She hissed. “I won’t tell you again to leave.”

“Or what?”

“I’ll call the police, asshole.”

“I’ve been sent here under the banner of diplomacy, what are they gonna do?”

You stepped out as the argument continued, your mother growing angrier as you tiptoed down the hallway to the kitchen. She grabbed a frying pan from the dish rack as you stopped in the doorway and she waved it at the man standing on the other side of the table.

“I’ll just have to make you,” She warned. “Now go--”

“Mum,” You rubbed your eyes. “What’s going on?” You looked to the man as he turned to look at you. It was the same man from the day before. You recoiled and pressed yourself to the wall. “Who is that?”

“No one. He’s leaving.” She edged around the table and drew back the frying pan.

He didn’t move. She swung and he caught the pan as his palm deflected it away from his head. He wrenched it away from her and tossed it away.

“Sit down, your highness,” He glared at your mother as he clanked the pan against the table.

You frowned and looked at your mother. Her eyes glinted at you and she shook her head.

“You will not tell my daughter what to do,” She scowled. “Not in my house.”

“You can send me away now, but I’ll be back.” He looked around the kitchen. “Looks like you can afford a fine lawyer, indeed.”

“Lawyer?” Your mother spat.

“There’s a contract, Princess,” He sneered.

“There is no kingdom left. No crown, no throne.” Your mother neared and grabbed your wrist, drawing you to her. “My daughter does not belong to anyone.”

“Your own father signed the accord. We paid our dues, even after his fall, we expect you to fulfill your end of the contract.”

“My father is dead,” She pushed in front of you, shielding you from the man. His square jaw twitched and his blue eyes glimmered defiantly.

“As his heir, you would acquire his responsibility. She is his first born granddaughter.” The man asserted.

“She has no title.” Your mother insisted. “You can see we have no wealth, no holdings. We are displaced; we are common.”

“Princess Karissa of Ecklun,” The man addressed your mother, “Her daughter, Duchess of Brey. You needn’t land to uphold your titles… and your obligations.”

“The contract is old. Outdated.” Your mother countered. “There are other duchesses. Real ones.”

“The contract is legal still, it has been upheld to this point and there is no clause for annulment. Unless of course you have the funds to buy out the agreement.” He challenged. “Fifteen million, with interest.”

Your mother was silent. He hand squeezed your wrist.

“I never received any of these payments you claim to have made,” She said.

“In a trust, as stated in the contract, to be accessible upon the day of marriage.” He declared. “If you insist, however, I can return with my legal council… and a military escort.”

Your mother let out a long breath. She released you and shakily pulled out a chair from the table. “Sit,” She gestured you forward and drew another chair out. “I’ll entertain your… discussion.”

You stepped forward and sat and she did too. The man across from you lowered himself into another chair and set down his briefcase on the floor. He reached inside and drew out a bundle of papers. He slid them across to your mother.

“If you’d like to look over the terms,” He smirked. “You’ll see all is as I said.”

“He couldn’t find another bride?” She spat as she ignored the contract.

“Not legally.” He insisted and looked at you. “Forgive me. I didn’t introduce myself, your highness. James Barnes, I am a representative of the Astranian court.”

“I don’t--” You blinked. “I don’t understand what’s--”

“Yes, apparently your mother has created a convincing ruse here in this… slum,” He sighed. “What do you know of your grandfather?”

“Don’t talk to her.” Your mother snipped. “Talk to me.”

“She must know--”

“I will explain. That is my responsibility. My right.” She sneered and grabbed the papers.

She flipped the first page, then the second, she continued as she hastily read through it. You peeked over her shoulder but she kept turning away to block you. When she finished, she turned it face down.

“You signed it, Princess,” The man said.

“I was sixteen.” She said. “I was still a child.”

“You were a married woman.” He returned.

“A girl forced into a ring.” She slapped the paper. “And you would have me do the same to my daughter?”

“You already did,” He said plainly. “And she is older. Quite a few years, in fact.”

“It took you years to find us,” She grinned. “You think you’ll be as lucky again?”

“You are being watched. You have been watched.” He pushed his shoulders back. “We have waited long enough.”

“Can someone tell me what the fuck is going on?” You said.

The man, Barnes, looked at you. Appalled.

“I will,” Your mother squeezed your arm. “Mr. Barnes.” She turned back to him, her head held high. “Might you allow me some time to prepare?”

“To run?” He challenged.

“If we are being watched as you say, that should not be an issue,” She sniffed. “You must understand the circumstance.”

“I do understand your negligence,” He raised a brow. “One day. That is all I can allow you.”

He left the contract and stood. He took his briefcase and nodded to the table. “A copy for your records.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a card and flicked it onto the document. “My information should you require it.”

He bowed his head and turned to leave you. The door opened and closed loudly as he strode out the back door. You sat, perplexed, and reached for the contract. Your mother caught your hand. She turned to you and drew your hand back with her.

“Honey,” She said softly. “I need you to listen to me. Just-- don’t talk, just listen.”

“Mum, I--”

“You’re going to hate me. I know that hate, I felt the same for my own father. I would not blame you for hating me even more than that.” She said grimly. “But please, there is much I need to tell you. That I should’ve told you before.”

“I don’t-- I don’t understand.” You sputtered.

“So just listen,” She pleaded. You nodded and your stomach bubbled nervously. “You’ve heard of Ecklun? You were always so fond of history.” You confirmed and she continued on. “And Astrania. Occasional allies until the dissolution of the former… but that all doesn’t matter.”

Your mother hung her head.

“My father knew the tide was against him. He tried to rally his reinforcements, he made promises to those he thought could help. He was the king, you see? He was dethroned, we were all thrown out of the country. I tried to… stay with him. Tried to make him move on but he wouldn’t. So after I had you, I left. Your father didn’t want to let go either and he refused to come with me.”

She touched her cheek and shuddered.

“It was all gone so I thought that meant it was over. Everything. The promises, the debts.” She shook her head. “I tried so hard to start over. For you. But… Your grandfather promised you to the heir of Astrania to fund his personal guard. The same that ejected us from our home.”

She twined her fingers together then pulled them apart. She gulped before she found her voice again.

“That heir is now in power,” She could barely look at you. “And you… you are to be his wife.”

“I-- no, they can’t-- it--”

“I thought I could stop it. I didn’t think they’d want it still but-- I always hated how backwards it all was. Bloodlines, lineage, privilege… It was all so ridiculous.” She huffed. “I-- tried. I failed.”

“You ran once, we can--”

“That man found me. I am not foolish to think he did not come with back-up. I have seen what happens when you undermine others. I have seen the ugliness of it. I can’t say what’s worse; to let them have you or to refuse and suffer further. You don’t know how-- I was stupid enough to think I could ever outpace them.”

You gaped at her. Shocked, angry, sickened.

“And now I can’t stop them.” She uttered.

“You didn’t tell me,” You breathed. “You should have told me.”

“I’m sorry--”

“I have school, work...I… No, they can’t. I have a life!” You stood and the chair wobbled.

“Honey, please,” She got to her feet. “I know how it feels. Trust me. My father, he did the same--”

“So what? Family tradition?” You scoffed. “They can’t make me. I’m staying. I’m going to school, I’m working. I’m not--”

“You don’t have a choice.”

“I won’t go!” You shouted.

“They’ll make you.”

“How?”

She looked at you. Her face was grim, her wrinkles more apparent than ever before. She didn’t need to say.

“They can’t--”

“They’ll find a way.” She muttered. “They always do. I’m so so sor--”

“So I’ll make them drag me,” You said. “I’ll fight it.”

“It’s treason--”

“It’s the twenty-first century!”

“Not there. It’s not the same as here. There’s no one to stop them.”

You didn’t know what to say. You hit the table and swore. You stormed from the room and slammed your door before you fell onto the bed and screamed into your pillows.

It was a dream. It had to be a dream!

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inplaynodelay · 3 years ago

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This Day In Music: 10 Dec 2007

Led Zeppelin make a comeback.

Led Zeppelin performed their first concert in 19 years as part of the Ahmet Ertegun Tribute Concert at London's 02 Arena. Jason Bonham, the son of their late drummer John Bonham, joined Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, and John Paul Jones on stage. More than a million people voted in a ballot for the 20,000 tickets available for the show, with all proceeds benefiting Ahmet's own charity. Zeppelin played 16 songs, with two encores. Dave Grohl, Jeff Beck, Brian May, David Gilmour, The Edge, Peter Gabriel, Mick Jagger, Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell, Jerry Hall, Priscilla Presley, and Paris Hilton were among those who attended the show.

In 1968, Led Zeppelin formed in London. The members of the band were vocalist Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham. They are regarded as one of the forefathers of hard rock and heavy metal, with a heavy, guitar-driven sound, despite drawing influences from a wide range of genres, including blues and folk music. Led Zeppelin are credited with having had a significant impact on the nature of the music industry, particularly in the development of album-oriented rock and stadium rock.

Page wrote most of Led Zeppelin's music, particularly early in their career, while Plant wrote most of the lyrics. Jones's keyboard-based compositions later became central to their music, which featured increasing experimentation. The latter half of their career saw a series of record-breaking tours that earned the group a reputation for excess and debauchery.

Led Zeppelin is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, with total worldwide record sales estimated to be between 200 and 300 million units. They had eight consecutive UK number-one albums and six consecutive US Billboard 200 number-one albums, with five of their albums certified Diamond in the US. They were dubbed "the heaviest band of all time," "the biggest band of the Seventies," and "unquestionably one of the most enduring bands in rock history" by Rolling Stone magazine. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995; according to the museum's biography of the band, they were "as influential" in the 1970s as the Beatles were in the 1960s.

On June 27 1980, during a concert in Nuremberg, Germany, John Bonham collapsed onstage and was rushed to hospital in the middle of the third song. The press speculated that his collapse was caused by excessive alcohol and drug use, but the band claimed that he had simply overeaten.

The band's first North American tour since 1977 was set to begin on October 17, 1980. Bonham was picked up by Led Zeppelin assistant Rex King on September 24th to attend rehearsals at Bray Studios. During the trip, Bonham requested a breakfast stop, where he drank four quadruple vodkas with a ham roll. He said to his assistant, "breakfast," after taking a bite of the ham roll. After arriving at the studio, he continued to drink heavily. Late that evening, the rehearsals were called off, and the band retired to Page's home, the Old Mill House in Clewer, Windsor.

Bonham, who had fallen asleep, was taken to bed and placed on his side shortly after midnight. The next day, at 1:45 p.m., Benji LeFevre (Led Zeppelin's new tour manager) and John Paul Jones discovered Bonham dead. The cause of death was asphyxiation from vomit, and the death was determined to be accidental.

The planned North American tour was cancelled and apart from an ill fated Live Aid performance, as well as some private gigs for band members birthdays Led Zeppelin didn't play together until the benefit concert in 2007. Despite almost annual rumours to reform, the band haven't played again in public since.

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#music #music history #music news #today in music history

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my-happy-little-bean · 3 years ago

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The Bookkeeper – Chapter 4

Chapter 4: The Starry Night

pairings: logicality, prinxiety words: 4387 chapter warnings: mild swearing, allusions to mental illness, mild dark humour summary: in which we read letters to the dead.

[read on ao3] [masterlist]

< previous chapter

–

What on Earth was he looking at here?

Logan stared at the display. A tiny baby figurine dangled in front of him, a long string of twine wrapped around its neck, thus hanging it from the ceiling.

His gaze hovered down to the nameplate for the piece: “ Fertility.”

“Are you kidding me…” Logan muttered under his breath, crossing his arms. He begrudgingly attempted to act intrigued while his mind ran blank.

He wasn’t sure if this display was what Patton intended for him to spend so much time at when he gave him the museum tickets, but here he was, spending precious time here : where the marble pillars stood at each corner of the room, where the air was thick with agreed-upon silence, where everything– everything– was beige, and where people in black turtlenecks lined the walls as they pinched their chins and hummed at the same time.

Logan knew Patton’s attempts of getting him out of the shop were well-intended, but he also knew this: he wasn’t supposed to be here. He was supposed to be writing, researching– anything but standing here and looking at what must have cost the artist two dollars.

Some cynical sense in him wondered if this answered his question more than he was able to on his own. Perhaps this was what giving up looked like. Perhaps, in a world with little to no meaning, art was meant to be a white flag; it was meant to mark where the earth cracked beneath your feet; it meant nothing.

“Quite the piece, hm?”

Logan spun on his heel. Facing him was a tall person, with brown eyes that basked golden in the sunlight that poured through the museum’s skylight. They wore a black vest overtop a pale, yellow button-up, sleeves rolled just before their elbow. Logan noted in particular the small enamel pin on the top right side of their vest; it was a small, twisting snake with scales of yellow, white, purple, and black. And Logan didn’t know much about people in general, but he knew that this was the sort of person you would look at twice in passing; once by accident, and once by enthrallment.

“Ferbachi’s ‘Fertility’ ,” the person hummed once more. A slight British accent tinged the end of their words. They stepped beside Logan and pointed at the twine around the hanging baby’s neck. “The twine represents fragility.”

“...It does?”

“No.” The person smiled smugly, not looking at Logan. “Not at all.”

Logan let out a small ‘ah’, awkwardly shifting back and forth.

“But I assume you were trying to find some meaning from the piece,” the person continued. “I’ve been watching you stand here, perplexed, for probably ten minutes now.”

‘It’s been ten minutes?’ Logan scrunched up his nose.

“You’ve been watching me?” he asked instead.

The person shrugged. “Only a little. Reminiscent of someone hiding a toy from a dog, and the dog trying to figure out where his toy went.”

A pause. The person then added, “That is to say, incredibly amusing.”

Logan narrowed his eyes on the individual. “Are all museum-goers this annoying?”

“No no.” A wide, Cheshire cat grin. “Just nosy.”

Logan huffed, muttering under his breath a string of curses. The person turned to face Logan and outstretched their hand.

“My name is Dr. Janus Carson,” they said. Each word sounded rich with caramel. “And I am not a museum-goer, I am one of the art curators here.”

Logan scoffed. “So you were the one who thought this was a worthwhile display?”

“Well one, not necessarily how curating works. And two...you can blame my colleague, Dr. Remus Harden. Most of the things he curates are more contemporary and...well, strange.”

“ This is contemporary art?”

“I would invite you not to act so surprised,” Janus replied pointedly. “Everything is made by someone...”

“Logan,” Logan supplied. “Logan Fray. He/him”

Janus nodded. “Everything is made by someone, Mr. Fray. Which means everything is enriched in some sort of purpose. Even if the purpose is meaningless.”

Logan blinked. Janus’ words felt like sound that was lost in a cave, helplessly bouncing against the walls, looking for somewhere to go.

“So why do you think someone made this?”

“I don’t know, Mr. Fray. Why does anyone make anything at all?”

A beat of silence.

“Precisely,” Logan murmured.

“Pardon?”

“I– um, is there somewhere I can get coffee here?” Logan blurted out. “I...I think I need a break from all–” He motioned at the hanging baby– “this.”

“Me as well,” Janus hummed, already walking away. They motioned for Logan to follow them without turning around. “And afterwards, I can give you a tour of something that perhaps can give you some answers.”

Logan felt his heart race. “How did you know I’m–”

“You are not the first pretentious existentialist to walk into a museum,” Janus drawled, still walking. Logan quickened his pace, frantically trying to stay beside them.

“How–”

“It’s Tuesday, Mr. Fray, and you’re in a museum alone.” Janus stopped and looked him up and down. “And honestly, the shoes give it away.”

Logan, bewildered and with child-like embarrassment, looked down at his shoes. He thought the shoes looked rather nice.

“Hurry along, Mr. Fray.” Janus’ accented voice rang in his ears like an alarm. “We don’t have all day.”

—

Patton paced back and forth along the shelves of Fray and Far Fables, Roman floating right behind him.

“How about The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert!” Roman magically lifted the book off the shelves and flew it over Patton’s head so it could stop Patton in his tracks. “I read it the other night and found it to be fascinating! There’s this grandma who writes real grim-dark fairy tales and dies and this girl– Alice– her mother gets stolen by someone in her grandma’s stories–”

“That sounds too spooky!” Patton waved his hand in front of the book and pushed through it, Roman lifting the book back up before Patton could barrel head-first into its hardcover.

“Gah– how about The Signature of All Things! You read that one recently! Wouldn’t you want to visit the Whittaker estate: the flowers, the plants–”

“I– I don’t know, I feel like I have already been there, ya know?”

“Great Odin’s eyepatch– Patton!” Roman flew over Patton’s head and hovered in front of his nose, arms crossed. “We’ve been walking circles around the store and you have yet to give me one book! When you said you wanted to go in a book nook, I didn’t expect to be bored!”

“I know, I know!” Patton buried his face in his hands. “There’s just so many choices! I don’t want to make a wrong choice!”

Roman sighed. “You can’t pick a wrong choice, Patton. And even if you do, we can always just leave and go to another one!”

Patton let out a muffled groan beneath his palms. Maybe he should’ve done a bit more research before coming in today.

He closed his eyes. A million stories appeared in the blots of the darkness; there were visions of the cotton-candy worlds in his bedtime stories, tall mountains and deep seas. Heck, if he really wanted to, he could just pick up Around the World in Eighty Days and he could go anywhere he wanted! (Probably!) So why was this so hard?

Patton opened his eyes and looked at Roman.

“What’s your favourite story?”

Roman’s frown sent a flurry of regret in Patton’s chest. But the feeling eased a bit when Roman scrunched up his face and whizzed right past him to one of the shelves behind the front counter.

“I have a favourite,” Roman finally said, “but you’re going to have to keep a secret. Is that okay?”

“Yeah! Yes, of course,” Patton stammered. He grabbed his sketchbook and watercolour set, tucking a brush behind his ear as he watched Roman disappear behind some of the books on the shelf.

The books Roman moved behind began to slowly lift themselves off the shelves. Patton watched with wonder as they parted in the air, like double doors to a castle, revealing Roman standing beside a thin book that was pressed flat against the back of the shelves, only showing its brown, leather cover. It seemingly blended into the colour of the wood.

“Oh!” Patton tucked his sketchbook and watercolour set underneath his arm. He then held out his hands as Roman levitated the book towards him. Patton let the book sit softly in his palms. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this one before.”

He opened the first page. It seemed like a notebook, pages yellowed with time. Patton squinted at the faded cursive scrawled on the lines: The Midnight Forest by…

“V...Aries,” Patton read aloud. Roman nodded, flying over to sit on Patton’s shoulder. Patton looked at him with a frown. “Isn’t this the philosopher Logan likes?”

“Mhm. Logan doesn’t know this ‘cause not many people do, but Virgil Aries used to write poetry books.” His smile faltered. “Well, a poetry boo k; it’s the one you’re holding right now . He only ever wrote one, and he didn’t even publish it.”

Patton smiled, flipping through some of the pages.

“Why haven’t you ever told Logan about it?”

A beat of silence.

“I don’t think I could. You’re sorta the only person who’s ever asked.” Roman shrugged. “Besides, it’s not like many people knew Virgil Aries by his poetry– they only ever knew him by his theories of philosophy.” A pause. Roman added, “It’s...it’s nice to keep some unknown parts of him away from all that.” He laughed quietly. “Dude was really sad.”

Patton nodded wordlessly, half-listening as he ran his fingers across the bumps of the pen marks on each thin page. It reminded him of the subtle glances he would sneak at Logan whenever he stopped by the shop, catching him writing or deep in thought as he browsed the books. He imagined if Virgil Aries might have let his pen dance across the paper, similar to the way he knew Logan did, ink gliding across paper floors almost seamlessly.

He took one more look at Roman, who was also reading over his shoulder. His eyebrow was furrowed and his demeanour seemed to dampen. Patton wondered then if Roman was thinking the same thing too.

“Alright! Well, I don’t know if you can make a book nook out of a poetry book, but I wouldn’t mind trying!” Patton finally said. Roman’s smile lifted ever so slightly. He floated off of Patton’s shoulder.

“I most definitely can!” Roman slowly descended onto the pages, going on one knee and pressing his palms flat against them. Circles of red magic appeared faintly beneath his hands.

“Lemme show you how book nooks are actually made! Hold on tight!”

“Hold on tight to wha–”

And before Patton could finish, he felt the book tremble in his hands. Strings of red magic suddenly sprouted from the open pages. Startled, Patton let go of the book. His eyes widened in fear before realizing that the book was staying in place in the air where he was holding it, Roman still kneeling on the pages.

Patton watched Roman’s right arm shoot up into the sky, vibrant red magic following its path. A flurry of cursive handwriting followed his palm, creating a double helix of words and magic.

Patton covered his face as a stream of it shot right past his ear. Warm air wrapped around him like he was in the eye of a hurricane. He clutched onto his sketchbook and his watercolours, grabbing the paintbrush behind his ear. He wielded the paintbrush as if it were some sort of sword, but somehow knew that he didn’t need to worry about protecting himself.

And then, Patton opened his eyes.

The first thing Patton noticed was the sky above them. Peeking beneath the shadowed branches of the tall trees was a painted sky of all shades of blue. Flurries of yellow were layered on top of the sky as floating lanterns, moving slowly like clouds in the wind.

Back on earth, small freckles of light spun around him and the forest clearing he stood in, as if the breeze was braiding golden thread in the air. It smelled like petrichor and freshly cut grass, and there was barely any noise; all Patton could hear was his own breathing, and his own heart.

“Holy...shit,” Patton whispered, lowering the paintbrush to his side.

“Why thank you!” Roman used the book as a makeshift magic carpet and guided it to rest on a log. The book easily gave into the shape of the surface it laid on like a blanket. Roman looked around the forest clearing, his smile falling. “Goodness, I haven’t done that in a long time.”

“It was amazing .” Patton grinned at Roman, though it was tinged with a bit of fear– no, not fear, curiosity. How could Roman have done all this? Who was he?

Patton held Roman’s gaze for a moment too long. Roman’s eyes glimmered with a dull sort of excitement and pride that felt as though it was meant for someone else. The air between them thickened with unexpected tension.

“Well, I can’t keep this open forever,” Roman said, clearing his throat. He motioned to the book. Patton caught sprinkles of pulsing red magic lining the book’s edges. “So if you’re going to get started on painting…”

“Yes! Yes, of course.” Patton decided to sit next to Roman on the log, setting his watercolour palette between the two of them. Then, he laid his sketchbook on his lap and got to work.

Patton wasn’t sure if time passed in the same way as it did on Earth (there was no way he was still on Earth) but he knew enough had passed for him to zone out in his painting, so wrapped up in his surroundings.

In the background, he could hear Roman reading out loud from the book.

“And if swirls of blue and yellow are not enough, and if the cities beneath are not enough

And if all these answers are not enough, love, may I give you this:

A forest made of spiral-words, and a sky made of whimsy mist.

Notice how I kiss you here, an angel lifted, then earthy heels in dirt adrift.

So now, when you return here, my love, I will never be missed.”

—

“I don’t love my job very much,” Janus hummed as they took a sip from their cup of coffee. They guided Logan through the halls of the museum. “All museums are a little problematic anyway. Most exhibits I see are just prizes for colonialism – bleh. ”

“Wonderful,” Logan deadpanned. “Life is just wonderful.”

“Isn’t it?” Janus gave Logan a smile that was cheeky enough to be Roman’s, but more serious.

Eventually, they arrived at more modern displays of art. Logan snuck a glance of the exhibit name as they passed by its sign: “ Ever Yours, Vincent : Exploring the Inner Workings of Vincent Van Gogh”.

“This is a recent exhibit I worked on. It isn’t quite ready for the public, but it is down to its final stages of revision. While I was interested in Van Gogh’s works, I was more so interested in what occurred beyond his canvas; in particular, his many letters to his brother, Theo.”

They both weaved through tall, staggered pillars of towering LED screens, which illuminated the dark room. The screens panned over rows of cursive handwriting, as if scanning through a list of ancient relics.

The hall of pillars eventually led to an open layout of interactable displays, glass casings filled with notebooks and paintbrushes and photos. The walls had ceiling-to-floor digital screens that moved through various scenes of Van Gogh’s artwork. Logan recognized a few: Irises, Café Terrace at Night, The Red Vineyard and, of course, The Starry Night.

“Such a bothered man created images that people see and feel enlightened by . I have never met a person who hasn’t felt hope looking at his starry night.”

Logan frowned, noting the swirls of blue and yellow that surrounded him. He didn’t know why, but he longed to touch the walls and feel each individual stroke of paint. He had looked at art before, but was never truly immersed in it.

“Some historians say he was depicting the view outside his asylum window,” Janus continued. “One of my favourite quotes from Van Gogh’s various letters to Theo touched upon this idea.”

Then, as if pulling the threads of their own memory, Janus closed their eyes and recited: “ ‘But what a beautiful land and what a beautiful blue and what a sun’. ”

They then opened their eyes and looked over at Logan with a small smile. “ ‘And yet I’ve only seen the garden and what I can make out through the window’.”

Logan found himself stunted by the quotation.

“He had depression, yes?”

“The diagnosis varies, but yes.” Janus’ lips twisted ever so slightly, staring at the walls surrounding them. “As I said, he was quite the bothered man.”

Logan nodded. On the tip of his tongue were questions about whether or not this proves his point; that even art cannot truly help someone escape the vast nothingness of life.

“You know, Van Gogh wasn’t really famous until after his death,” Janus said after a moment of silence. “Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, his brother’s wife, was the one who told his stories. She pushed for his art to find an audience, and she translated the letters between Van Gogh and his brother.”

As if on cue, translucent cursive slowly sprawled across the screened image of The Starry Night. The script ran alongside the slow-moving swirls of light over the silhouetted town depicted in the painting.

“I told you that I do not love my job, but in reality, I need to do this job more than anything else I need to do. And it’s because of Johanna’s work. It proves that there are stories everywhere, hidden under layers and layers of paint. Beneath every painting is a canvas, beneath the words of a letter is the paper on which they are written.”

Janus’ words were exhaled slowly, their surrounding air rich with a lifelong commitment Logan couldn’t begin to understand. They motioned at the walls, and Logan followed their hand. Logan’s irises were filled with pulsing light.

“Without a canvas, The Starry Night would just be paint, still sitting in the cans. Without the paper, Vincent and Theo would never have talked. Without Johanna, none of that would have mattered. There can be no audience for a story without someone presenting it somehow. Someone needs to be the canvas, and someone needs to be the paper.”

Janus’ words washed over Logan like gentle, moonlit tides. The scene around them slowly dissipated into another painting. The same show of art danced around him like a bewitched merry-go-round.

Logan then looked at Janus, whose eyes were filled with a sense of unshaken fulfillment. Their smile walked a fine line between the walls of definite and whatever laid beyond it.

“So why, then, does anyone make anything at all, Mr. Fray? Well, I am not sure. But I do know this: I preserve art and stories, which is to say, I preserve purpose . And I preserve all of this because they are important. In a life with very little meaning, art worms its way into the spaces that it can fit. And with the help of others, art– and everything it represents– is made bigger than the spaces of life they initially occupy.”

Janus’ eyes twinkled. “All this being said, Mr. Fray, you can imagine what this means for all the stories that follow.”

Janus’ break eventually ended a few minutes later, and as the two parted ways, Logan felt unable to leave the exhibit. A whirlwind of oil paint and words filled his vision as he let Janus’ words settle in his chest. Then, similar to all things in life, the spectacle faded; and in the moment between the next digital display of painted scenery, Logan was left alone in the vast space of emptiness.

—

Logan entered Fray and Far Fables much later than he had anticipated. He was unsure of whether or not he would catch Patton before he left, but said uncertainty was resolved as soon as he walked through the door.

Patton was sitting on an armchair, in hysterics as Roman—to Logan’s horror—magically flipped through a photo album that floated in the air. Roman puppeteered the album like it was a pop-up book, blurry and holographic film footage folding up into view and then back down into the page. The footage showed a young Logan bounding through a backyard, and then an even younger Logan having a tea party with all his stuffed animals.

“What are you– Roman!” Logan bolted towards the photo album and swiped it out of the air, closing it with a swift slam!

“Aw, come on, Lo!” Patton pouted.

“Yeah, rude interference, Moby Dick ,” Roman quipped, but with a smug smile all the same. “I was going to show Patton the pictures of you in your school’s play of The Sound of Music. ”

Patton went starry-eyed. “You were in The Sound of Music?”

Logan rolled his eyes, ignoring both of them as he sat on the chair opposite of Patton.

“Is this really how you spent your first day of book nook adventuring?” He narrowed his eyes at Roman. “I am praying that the answer is no.”

“No, of course not! I just had some energy left to re-animate some precious memories.”

Logan sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. A part of him burned wondering if Patton was somehow embarrassed by it all.

“And precious they were!” Patton piped in, diffusing the flame immediately. “Little Logan running around– ah, I was ready to cry!”

“Thank you, I suppose.” Logan relaxed himself into a smile. “Well then, where did you both go?”

Patton and Roman exchanged looks that, quite frankly, concerned Logan all over again. He had a feeling that mixing the two of them together spelled chaos.

“Some old poetry book!” Patton finally said. “I don’t quite remember the name, do you?”

“Nope!” Roman barked out a laugh. “You know me! Ever the scatter-brain!”

“...Right. ” Logan pursed his lips, not believing either of them for a second, but feeling too tired to press on.

“I did, however, make you something!” Patton grabbed his sketchbook off the coffee table and carefully tore out one page. Logan felt himself grow warm once more.

“Patton, you do not have to give me all your paintings…”

“Nonsense! It’s the least I can do.” Patton passed over the paper. Logan carefully took it in his hands.

In a stroke of odd coincidence, the palette that Patton had chosen was uncannily similar to The Starry Night. It was also less abstract than Patton’s usual style. Patches of navy blue and golden yellow flooded the sky above what seemed to be the silhouette of a forest clearing, which bordered the sides of the painting with dark greens and various shades of black. In the middle of the clearing were a circle of leaves, an open book laying in its centre. And hovering above the book was a small figure, leaving a trail of cursive handwriting and dark red dust, which glimmered ever so slightly in the moonlight that Patton had let fall upon the painted scenery.

“My goodness, Patton...” He looked up at him, not exactly knowing what to say.

“Pretty good, right?” Patton smiled with an uncharacteristic amount of confidence. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so immersed in anything in...well, my whole life!”

“Art can do that to you, I suppose,” Logan let slip. In the corner of his eye, Roman did a double take.

“I suppose so!” Patton stood up, scooping up his notebook and his various art supplies.

“Well, anyway, I hope I didn’t overstay my welcome! I was just waiting for you to come back from the museum– oh! How was that by the way?”

Logan found himself without words once more. Eventually, he just ended up saying, “It was good, Patton. Very...good.”

“Well, good!” Patton giggled. Logan could almost hear the twinkling of painted stars in his laugh. “I think I have an idea of where I want you to go next, but I might wait ‘till my next visit. I need to let everything just settle, heh.”

“You’re valid,” Logan hummed. He held Patton’s stare for a moment too long before clearing his throat. “I...I look forward to seeing what you have next in store for me, Patton.”

Patton broke into a wide, shining smile as he gave Logan a hug. Chills ran down Logan’s spine and jumped between the distance made when Patton pulled away.

When Patton left the shop, Logan took a deep breath and began his routine of closing up. Roman trailed behind him.

“So! What are you going to write about tonight?”

Logan could practically feel Roman’s smug smile behind his back.

“I’m going to write about nothing,” he murmured decidedly. Roman raised an eyebrow at him. Logan shrugged wordlessly. Janus’ words filled his mind once more, as if beckoning him to write everything down in a maddening fury. But even if the exact phrasing faded, the feelings elicited remained the same. And if he was going to understand those feelings…

“I need to lie down,” Logan finally said, going over to flip the door sign to ‘closed’ before heading upstairs. “I just...I need some time to be quiet.”

But despite this attempt, Logan was everything but quiet. For the remainder of the night, he bounced his new ideas and revelations off of Roman, who comically flew above his bed, grabbing each word out of the air in a flurry of ‘told you so!’s.

Logan, however, simply let it happen. He realized that for the first time in a very long time, the pressure of telling others things was slowly being lifted by the experience of being told something; of knowledge being given to him rather than taught.

And somewhere underneath the sandy shores of his chest, a new tide of magic rippled through Logan’s entire core.

The next day, Logan glowed just a bit brighter.

—

next chapter >

#TS Storytime 2021 #gabbie writes things #sanders sides #sanders sides fanfic #logicality #prinxiety #logan sanders #patton sanders #roman sanders #virgil sanders #logan/patton #roman/virgil #logic/morality #creativity/anxiety

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lastbluetardis · 4 years ago

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Chemical Reaction (17/22)

Summary: Though their chemistry class is now over, the chemistry between James and Rose is just getting started. Together, they navigate the highs of new love and the lows of coping with past trauma to forge deep and unbreakable bonds of love and commitment. Part 2 in the Catalysis series. Tagging @doctorroseprompts

This chapter: ~8400 words, explicit (for one small scene). Here we are folks! The culmination of the feels of the last several chapters. Enjoy xo.

If you like my stories, consider leaving me a tip? I know these are trying times, but if you are able, I would really appreciate it xoxo. And as always, comments and reblogs are very much appreciated as well.

AO3 | FF | TSP

Ch1 | Ch2 | Ch3 | Ch4 | Ch5 | Ch6 | Ch7 | Ch8 | Ch9 | Ch10 | Ch11 | Ch12 | Ch13 | Ch14 | Ch15 | Ch16 | Ch17 | Ch18 | Ch19 | Ch20 | Ch21 | epilogue

April was usually one of James’s least favorite months. The weather was wet and cold, and with it being the last month of the semester, it was always busy with exams and projects. This year, however, he had the pleasure of knowing it was his beloved’s birth month; even though he didn’t know the precise date, that made it all the more fun as, day after day, he greeted Rose with a “Happy Birthday” snog.

Yet every day, she giggled and said, “Not today.” He wasn’t sure what he would do on the morning she kissed him and replied instead with, “Thank you.” Despite his brilliant, magnificent brain, he was stumped on a way to make an ordinary day extraordinary for her.

Though she said she didn’t want anything for her birthday, he couldn’t help but preemptively get her a simple gift: a silver necklace with an infinity heart pendant. The heart was studded with blue zircon—one of his birthstones—while the infinity loop was studded with small diamonds, her birthstone. Cliché, he knew, but the design had caught his attention. He hoped Rose would like it.

James had been carrying it around with him since the start of the month to be presented to her on her date of birth. Whenever the hell that was.

The weeks seemed to fly by, and still it wasn’t her birthday. He had several chilling moments of panic that maybe he somehow missed it, but then resigned himself to the fact it must be at the end of the month. Her so-called hint to him had told him it wasn’t the first or last day of the month… Rose would be cheeky enough to call that a hint if it turned out her birthday was the second to last day of the month. Nevertheless, James was having fun with their little game and worked to make the month special for Rose.

Though he knew she had been teasing when she’d suggested they make love every day so that she would wake up to birthday sex, they nearly met that goal, thanks to Rose staying overnight at his house more often than not. They were both growing to love the routine of cohabitating; James would drive them into the university in the morning, they would attend their respective classes, then they would meet up at the end of the day for him to drive them home again. Even on the days when one of them started earlier than the other, they drove in together, regardless.

While James’s main goal was to make April particularly special for Rose, he found himself realizing that even if it wasn’t her birthday month, he wouldn’t have done anything differently. It was a happy coincidence that the month happened to be filled with a multitude of romantic date night opportunities.

He had surprised her with tickets to the play put on by the university’s theater program, and had told her they would make an entire night out of it. He had dressed in a suit and tie; she had donned a gorgeous evening dress. Reminiscent of their Valentine’s Day plans, they’d had an early dinner out at a nice restaurant before driving to the university for the show. And when they’d gotten home, they peeled the other out of their nice clothes and made sweet love until midnight.

And when he took her to the cherry blossom festival in Washington, D.C., it wasn’t a birthday surprise, either. He would have wanted to tour the capital with Rose and bask in the beauty of the cherry trees no matter the month. There was nothing more romantic than walking hand-in-hand with Rose beneath the pink and white trees while the soft petals floated down around them. Nothing made him happier than seeing her face light up with awe as she took photograph after photograph of the scenery. Though the cherry blossoms weren’t as stunning as typical years, thanks to a warm snap in February followed by an arctic blast that killed some buds in mid-March, the scenery was stunning nevertheless.

They’d had fun exploring the various museums and historic sites in the city as well, but James’s favorite part was watching Rose scribble furiously in her sketchbook when they got back to their hotel room each night. She filled over a dozen pages during their four-day trip; she shared every single one with him, including the portrait of him she’d drawn one morning when she had awoken before him, and had occupied herself with sketching him asleep in the nude. Unlike her previous nude sketches of him, she did not cover his nether regions with a sheet, or simply not draw them at all. No, she had drawn every naked inch of him, down to the morning erection he had been sporting (which had also prompted her to draw a caricature of that very piece of his anatomy, making him howl with laughter when she eventually showed him the picture of a very prominent, very erect penis on a teeny tiny little person).

Playing tourist with Rose was one of James’s favorite things to do, so even if it had not been Rose’s birth month, he would not have changed a thing. It was a mere bonus, pure happenstance, that they managed to go on so many romantic dates that month.

As the month plowed on, bringing him ever-closer to Rose’s elusive birthday and to the end of the semester, another date idea came to him. And this time, he intended to make it double as a birthday gift.

With only a week and a half left to go in the month, and Rose’s birthday falling somewhere in that time frame, James woke up one morning to an email from the student life office at the university. They were advertising discounted tickets to a Philadelphia Phillies baseball game at the end of the month. Perfect! He loved showing Rose more of the state she lived in, as well as the culture of America. And honestly, what was more American than a baseball game?

Rose was still asleep as James read the details of the email, though their alarm was due to go off in a few minutes. He silenced it on his phone and instead gently woke Rose up with a series of kisses to any part of her face not smooshed into her pillow. She grunted and buried her face completely into the pillow.

Chuckling, he tried again, this time pressing the long expanse of his body into hers. He shivered when his hips rubbed into her upper thigh; he woke up hard nearly every morning, and today was no exception. Some mornings, he didn’t feel a pressing need to do anything with it; others, when he snuggled up against Rose, his heartbeat concentrated into a dull, throbbing, insistent pulse between his legs. He was experiencing the latter, and hoped she would be in the mood to make love with him.

“Rose,” he murmured, nuzzling his nose into her hair. He wriggled down a few inches and tucked his nose into the join of her neck and shoulder. He kissed her there and smiled when she shuddered. “Rooooose.”

“M’sleepin’,” she mumbled, but she tilted her head to free up her neck for him.

“Oh? Well, I guess we can’t partake in any morning activities I might’ve had planned,” he lamented, though he pressed slow, open-mouthed kisses to her neck. Goosebumps spread across her skin and he could hear her breathing going ragged the longer he kissed her.

She moaned softly when he scraped his teeth across her ear lobe. Finally, she stopped pretending. Turning her face out of her pillow, Rose slung her arm around his shoulders, hauling him closer for a proper kiss.

“Got another date idea,” he breathed between kisses.

“Don’t care,” she answered, chasing his lips.

“I’d like for it to double as your birthday gift.”

“Don’t care,” she repeated. His head emptied of all coherent thought when she reached down between them and took him in her hand, pumping him firmly. His nerves sparked with pleasure as desire settled heavily in his lower belly.

“But I… oh, blimey… I care… God…”

She nipped at his bottom lip and gave him a small squeeze on the upstroke that made stars burst behind his eyes. “You care more about that than what we’re doing?”

He could hardly draw in breath, so focused was he on the addictive rhythm of her hand. Each drag of her fist up and down his length heightened his need for her until he was certain nothing in the world was more important than being inside her.

But the smirk on her face brought out his competitive nature.

“Well, I’m quite cl-clever,” he choked out, trembling when she tightened her hold around him and picked up the pace. “I can walk and chew gum… talk and have se-ex shit!”

Rose guided him between her legs, nudging the tip of him into her wet heat. God, he’d barely paid any attention to her and yet she was so ready. He swallowed down his impatient whimper when she merely teased him, rubbing him through her folds rather than guiding him in.

“Hmm, I clearly am not doing a good enough job,” she mused, her voice frustratingly steady while he could hardly contain his gasps and sighs.

His brain nearly short-circuited. Not doing a good enough job? It was taking every ounce of concentration and restraint he had to try to hold this conversation with her; he would be done for if she tried any harder.

“The university is sponsoring another trip to Phillies… er, Philadelphia,” he squeaked, squeezing his eyes shut to think past the desperate need throbbing through him.

“Oh?” she asked, voice breathless as she stimulated herself with the head of his erection.

“Yeah, yep.” He cleared his throat, hoping it would stop cracking. “A trip to a Phillies game. Professional base-ball!”

Rose slung her leg over his hip and took him inside of her in one smooth, deep movement. Her momentum sent him to his back. Taking full advantage and giving him no reprieve, she sat astride him and began a brutal rhythm that stole his breath, stole his thoughts.

“Shit!” he rasped when the burning pressure in his belly bottomed out. Don’t come, oh God, please don’t come… Baseball. Think of baseball. Phillies, Philadelphia, bus trip, baseball game, showing Rose the stadium, teaching Rose the game… Rose… Rose…

Rose was squeezing him from the inside, giving him such delicious friction as she arched her hips hard into his.

Fighting a losing battle, he choked out, “Sorry… gonna come… sorry… shit!”

Rose caught his lips in a searing kiss as he grunted and panted and moaned his way through his release, trying not to be mortified and to instead enjoy the pleasure and love flooding through him.

He was trembling when his ears stopped roaring. Cheek burning, he groaned and covered his face with his hands.

“That was delightful,” Rose said, a grin in her voice as she lightly tugged at his fingers.

“That was embarrassing,” he countered, moving his hands to her hips. “Sorry.”

She slowly pulled off of him and collapsed onto her back beside him. “You do realize I was trying to do that, right? You’re always so damn considerate and attentive. It was my turn to focus solely on you and getting you off.”

“I feel selfish for coming first,” he complained.

Rose shrugged and pecked a kiss to his temple. “How do you think I feel when you pleasure me more than once before you get off?”

“Hopefully extremely satisfied,” he drawled, winking at her.

She rolled her eyes, but kissed him soundly. “I enjoyed doing that very much for you, so shut up about it.”

He zipped his fingers across his lips, though a grin stretched across them. He caught her lips in another kiss as he let his fingers walk down her body, between her legs. She must have woken up as randy as he had been, because it hardly took any time at all before she arched her back and cried her pleasure into their quiet bedroom.

As she panted and trembled beside him, he stroked her hips, her belly, her thighs, any part of her he could reach, and tried his initial conversation again.

“The university is sponsoring a trip to a Phillies baseball game,” he said. “Have you watched baseball? It’s a fun sport. One of my favorites, actually. I probably ought to get my UK citizenship revoked for that, but I can’t get into the football matches. Though plenty of people find baseball to be boring too. To each their own. Anyways, tickets are twenty dollars, and it covers admission to the game and transportation to and from the stadium. It’s on April twenty-sixth. It’s a night game… 7:05 start time. I would like to make this your birthday gift. Well. One of your birthday gifts, since, really, I want to go to the game anyway, to hell whether it’s your birthday or not. But since I’ve only got about ten days left to choose from, I figure that’s a close enough window to claim it as a birthday gift for you. What do you think? April twenty-sixth… does that sound like a birthday gift to you?”

Rose giggled and pinched his side, drawling, “Very subtle, love.”

James pouted. “Seriously? You’re still not gonna give me your birth date? I’ve been patient all month long!”

Rose cackled. “You liar! You have not at all been patient. At least once a day you beg me to tell you when my birthday is.”

“That is me being patient,” he grumbled, though he grinned when Rose laughed at him again. Even though they would need to get up soon, he tightened his hold around her and snuggled closer to her soft, warm body. “Wanna go to the Phillies game?”

“Sounds like fun,” she replied, running her fingers through his hair. His scalp prickled pleasantly, and he could have easily fallen asleep. But alas…

“We need to get up,” he groaned, burying his face farther into her neck. Rose heaved out a sigh, clearly as reluctant to move as he was. “Wanna share a shower?”

“How could I say no to that?”

With a parting kiss, they rolled out of bed and stumbled into the bathroom.

oOoOo

“You know, I’ve never been to a professional sports stadium before,” Rose said as they strolled, hand in hand, away from the packed parking lot towards Citizens Bank Park, home of the Philadelphia Phillies baseball team. “Wasn’t much into sports back home, and didn’t really have the money for it.”

James gave her hand a squeeze and watched her out of the corner of his eye. Something was… off. She’d been agitated when he’d picked her up from her flat that morning to drive her to the university. She was short and snippy with him, but insisted she was fine even though she obviously wasn’t, which had only annoyed him in return.

He had nearly called off their date to Philly, since she obviously wasn’t having a good day and he didn’t think he could stomach an entire night of forced joviality. However, after classes, she had met him in the library as planned and was decked out in a red Phillies sweatshirt and matching lipstick, greeting him as though their tense morning hadn’t happened.

“Where did you get that?” he’d asked, fluttering his hands at her top.

“The internet. Turns out everything exists on the internet,” she’d teased, bumping her hip into his.

He had been thrown by her chipper mood, and Rose must have sensed that. She reached up for a hug and squeezed him so tightly, it was as if all the tension that had been settled over his body was suddenly gone. She lightly kissed his cheek and whispered, “Sorry for this morning.”

“What was the matter?” he asked, keeping her in his arms for several more seconds.

“I’ll explain later,” she said. “I don’t really wanna talk about it now. I wanna go watch some baseball!”

It had taken everything he had to not snap at her to just bloody talk to him. Instead, he promised himself he would check in with Rose after the game, or perhaps tomorrow, since it would be late by the time they got home. But he wanted to know what was bothering her, and what had been intermittently troubling her these past few weeks.

That dark day she had had nearly a month ago still niggled at the back of his mind. He wanted to ask her what had happened, but so long had passed that he wasn’t sure how to broach the subject.

Hey Rose! Remember that day you yelled at me in the food court then started crying? What happened?

No, that wouldn’t do. Because what if she didn’t remember? What if nothing at all had happened and she’d had a breakdown over a bunch of little things that didn’t matter anymore? He had been hoping she would tell him on her own time, because he didn’t want to press. And it wasn’t as though he had forgotten about the episode, but he often got too caught up in the present with Rose that he wouldn’t think of it until he was alone again. Part of his brain admonished him, telling him that he could easily have that conversation with Rose through text.

Presently, they scanned their admission tickets at the front gate and stepped through the turnstile into the stadium. James inhaled deeply, catching a whiff of cigarette smoke, fresh air, grass, and greasy food. There was a unique and distinct scent of a baseball stadium that he loved.

Rose let go of his hand and darted forward, her gaze locked on the field in front of them. James followed, smiling to himself. He stood behind her and wrapped his arm around her waist as Rose drank in the sight of the enormous baseball friend in front of them. The grass was lush and verdant, neatly trimmed in the familiar crisscross pattern most baseball diamonds favored. The dirt of the infield looked soft and dry, though the grounds crew were in the middle of hosing it down. The late evening sun cast long shadows across the field while the stadium lights, already switched on in preparation for the night game, created a multi-shadow effect as well.

“Selfie?” James asked, fishing his phone from his pocket.

“Need some help?”

James glanced over and saw a young couple approaching them. The woman held her hand out for his phone, which he handed over. He then wrapped his arm around Rose’s middle. She turned into his side and linked her arms loosely around his hips.

The young woman took several photographs for them, all of them beautiful. James thanked her, then reciprocated the gesture, snapping a photograph of the couple with the baseball field behind them.

When the couple had departed, James took Rose’s hand again and they leisurely strolled around the concourse of the stadium. There was a beer stand every dozen paces, it seemed, and though it was ridiculously overpriced, James forked over the money and bought them a beer apiece. They sipped it as they walked, inspecting the various food stands and merchandise on display.

“What the bloody hell is that?”

James laughed when Rose picked up a plush toy of a furry green creature with a plump belly and elongated snout.

“He’s the team’s mascot,” James answered. “The Phillie Phanatic.”

“What is it?”

James shrugged. “The Phanatic. He’s not really anything, I suppose. He’s his own creature. Don’t knock him, though; the fans love him.”

Rose glanced dubiously up at him, but replaced the toy. James made a mental note to order one for her as a gag gift.

As they continued walking, James’s belly rumbled with hunger when he smelled the intoxicating aroma of bread, beef, and cheese.

“If I get a cheesesteak, will you eat half of it?” he asked. “‘Cos I wanna get crab fries too, but I can’t eat both of those by myself. Actually, the crab fries are right over there.” He took Rose’s shoulders in his hands and pivoted her gently, pointing to a concession stand with a giant logo that read Chickie’s & Pete’s. He rooted in his pocket for a crumpled twenty-dollar bill. “Will you get us an order of fries? With cheese.”

“Er… okay,” Rose said, blinking. “What the hell is a crab fry?”

James snorted. “French fries—chips—with old bay seasoning. They’re really good, I promise.”

Rose leaned up and pecked a kiss to his cheek. “You’re lucky I trust your taste in food.”

She left him to go get their crab fries, while he stood in the Tony Luke’s line for a cheesesteak. Though the line was nearly thirty-people deep, it moved very quickly. Ten minutes later, he spotted Rose waiting for him in a secluded corner near the ramp they would need to take to go to their second-deck seats.

The university had bought out an entire section in right field, and James recognized many of the students lounging in the seats. He had managed to procure front-row end seats for him and Rose. He allowed her to take the end seat, then plopped unceremoniously onto the hard blue chair beside her.

“Beautiful, innit?” he asked, nudging his elbow into her ribs.

“It’s a gorgeous night,” she agreed. “Look at that sunset.”

“View’s nice too,” James said, leaning forward in his seat to look down at the field. Apart from losing a little bit of vision of the right field playing area directly beneath them, they could see the entire ballfield very well.

There was a half hour to go before game time, so they ate their dinner and chatted mindlessly with each other and with their fellow schoolmates who had come on the trip as well. They posed for a giant group photo that was then shared to all of the university’s social media pages.

James was full and content by the time the Phillies players took the field, and he draped his arm around Rose’s shoulders as he explained the rules of baseball to her.

The game was fairly straightforward, with no tricky calls he had to break down for her. There was a ton of action in the first few innings, with both team getting a few home runs, including a grand slam by one of the Phillies’ stars. The stadium erupted with cheers and the LED Liberty Bell began to ring as the Phillie trotted his way around the bases. Rose appeared to be caught up in the atmosphere, jumping and cheering along with the crowd.

It was fun, James thought, to be sharing this with Rose. He made a mental note to keep an eye out for other discounted ticket specials, even if it wasn’t for the Phillies. A minor league team was based close to the university, and he imagined he could get tickets fairly cheaply, if it would be something Rose was interested in.

During one of the inning breaks, Rose had turned to him, flushed and beaming. She looked breathtaking, with the lights from the stadium glowing behind her and casting her hair in a golden halo around her head. He felt his mouth go dry and his heart kick up a notch.

Rose frowned at him. “What? You all right?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I…” He swallowed thickly, then smiled at her. “You’re beautiful.”

Her cheeks flushed a deeper red and a shy smile crossed her face. He reached over to brush a stray wisp of hair from her face, but then kept his hand on her cheek. “Love you.”

They moved at the same time, leaning closer until their noses brushed, then their lips pressed together. The noises of the stadium disappeared, lost in the heavy pounding of his heart as he kissed Rose. Her mouth was warm and soft, though felt a little funny with the slightly waxy texture of her lipstick.

He had meant for it to be a quick little kiss, though he should have known better; how often was he able to give Rose only one kiss? Angling his head slightly to the side, James lost himself in her, in the warmth of her hands. One of them was on the nape of his neck, the other at his waist, clinging to his sweatshirt as he devoured her lips. His tongue swept along hers, then trailed across the roof of her mouth. He delighted in her full-body shiver.

Before he could do it again, there was an explosion of noise around them.

“Hey, you’re not making a porno here!”

James wrenched away from Rose, blinking dazedly at the person who had interrupted them. It was one of their fellow students. He nudged James’s shoulder, then pointed towards the giant screen above left-center field.

His own dazed face looked back at him.

Kiss Cam. Oh, dear…

He grinned sheepishly at the camera, then pecked a chaste kiss to Rose’s temple. She looked equally abashed. Blessedly, the camera panned away from them, though the crowd of university students around them continued jeering and teasing.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” he murmured to Rose.

“S’not your fault. I wasn’t exactly beating you off of me.” He snorted and kissed her cheek. “You’ve got lipstick on you.”

James licked his swollen, tingling lips. A moment later, Rose cradled his jaw in her palm and rubbed a damp napkin across his mouth. It came away stained red. Her own mouth was smudged with lipstick, and he helped her clear it off, too.

“You are too enticing,” he concluded when they were lipstick free. “How am I supposed to restrain myself from kissing you?”

“Maybe you shouldn't,” Rose drawled, and she leaned up to plant a hard kiss to his mouth again.

Of course, the Kiss Cam found them once again, to the delight of the stadium, and to their fellow students, who didn’t let them live it down for the rest of the night.

The last few innings passed without much excitement and ended with the Phillies winning seven to four over the Miami Marlins. They were exhausted as they traipsed to the charter bus that would take them back to the school.

It was just after eleven o’clock when the bus returned to campus, and almost midnight by the time James pulled up in front of Rose’s flat. For once, he was staying overnight with her, per her request. The climb up to her fifth-floor flat was exhausting, and James wanted to curl up with Rose and go directly to sleep.

“What time is it?” Rose muttered to herself when she unlocked her front door and stepped into her dark flat. She flipped on the lights and glanced in the direction of the stove; 11:42 glowed green from the digital display. “Ooof, gotta wee. Stay here!”

She sprinted down the hall and slammed the bathroom door behind her. James was left laughing and shaking his head at her.

He set his keys and wallet down on the kitchen table, but as he was about to toe off his shoes, an open, hand-written letter caught his eye. He didn’t mean to snoop, but his eyes and brain worked independently of each other and before he knew it, he’d glanced at the end of the letter, where the name Jimmy was printed in a messy scribble.

His ears rang hollowly and his head swam. Jimmy. Jimmy? As in, Jimmy Stone? Jimmy Stone, Rose’s wanker of an ex-boyfriend?

A righteous anger welled up in James; what the hell did Jimmy want with Rose? And how dare he contact her out of the blue after all this time.

Before he was entirely aware of his actions, James plucked up the piece of paper, eyes frantically scanning across the words.

Rosie,

I’ve started this letter half a dozen times now, and I’m no closer to knowing how to say exactly what I want to say. It seems surreal that we’ve been talking again. I’ve missed you so much, you have no idea. It’s like I’ve found a piece of myself I didn’t know was lost. I’m not complete without you, and I hate the person I am without you.

This past month has been the happiest of my life because I’ve been able to talk to you again. I am thankful that you let me apologize, because there is nothing more I’ve wanted to do for the last six months. Getting sober has made me realize a lot of things, but it especially showed me that I missed you and that I want you. The worst mistake I ever made was how I treated you, and I will spend the rest of my life hating myself for it. I will spend the rest of my life (our life?) making it up to you.

I love you, Rosie. I love you so fucking much. You make me feel like I can do anything, and I love how I feel when I’m with you. We were the best thing to ever happen to me, and I’m such an idiot for destroying the perfect, wonderful life we had made together. I think I was scared. I was scared of not being able to support the both of us with my music, and I was scared about how much I needed you. You were a comfort to me, something I knew would always be there for me, something reliable, and it was scary for me to need anything that much. But I’m not scared anymore, and I know I can make it work this time. As you said, we were young, stupid kids and we made young, stupid mistakes. Now we can start fresh and build something even better than before.

I know you’re at school in America (which I always knew you could do! I always knew you were smart enough for school, despite what you said about yourself). I’m happy you’re enjoying your time in America. I want you to enjoy your time there, while you can. I’ll be here waiting for you when you come home. I’ll wait forever for you because you’re worth it. You’re so worth it, Rosie. I would wait a thousand years for you if I needed to. I hope I don’t have to though.

This time we can work harder together to make us work. I know you might not be ready to trust me yet, but I promise I will show you how serious I am. How committed I am. I will do whatever it takes to make this work between us, because I hate the thought of my life without you in it.

In the meantime, texting you will hold me over. I cherish every day, every moment that I can talk to you.

All my love,

Jimmy

James could barely think, could barely breathe. Something was squeezing his chest tighter and tighter until he thought he might suffocate as he read and reread the words of the letter. The love letter. The love letter that Rose’s ex-boyfriend wrote to her after a month—a month?!—of them having texted back and forth.

Acid churned in the pit of his stomach, eating away at his guts and making him certain he was about to vomit all over Rose’s floor. And worst of all, his chest was collapsing in on itself and his heart was breaking into more pieces than he thought possible. An entire month, Rose had been texting her ex-boyfriend—the ex-boyfriend she had supposedly written off and hadn’t deigned to contact in three and a half years.

And she hadn’t told him. A month, and she hadn’t said a single word.

His pulse thundered in his ringing ears so loudly that he didn’t hear the approaching footsteps until the sheet of paper was abruptly yanked out of his hands.

oOoOo

It was a relief to empty her bladder after holding it for most of the trip home. She had been tempted to use the toilets at the stadium, but the lines had been impossibly long.

With that need dealt with, Rose washed her hands and then her face. She felt greasy and grimy, and would have preferred to get a shower, but she only had a couple minutes before midnight, and she could finally tell James it was her birthday. She deserved a damn medal for not spilling the beans early—though there had been a few close calls—but she couldn’t deny it had been fun to play with James all month. She couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought to simply look at her identification card, where her birthday was plainly printed in bold. But that was her James, wasn’t it? The smartest idiot in the room.

She rushed to brush her teeth and comb out her hair before she left the bathroom and skipped to her kitchen/dining/living room.

James stood by the kitchen table, a sheet of paper in his hands and a stricken expression on his pale face.

Oh. Oh, no… Her stomach dropped. He was reading the disgusting letter that had arrived from Jimmy out of the blue yesterday afternoon.

She didn’t know whether she was more embarrassed, considering the content of the letter James was reading, or angry that he had snooped through her things and read her mail. The former won, but fueled the latter.

Rushing up to him, Rose yanked the letter harshly out of his fingers. He flinched as though she had struck him.

“What are you doing?” she snapped, folding up the paper and setting it on the kitchen table beneath one of her class notebooks.

“What am I doing? What are you doing? You’ve been chatting with your ex-boyfriend for an entire month?!”

There was an awful combination of accusation and hurt in his voice that simultaneously grated against her nerves and broke her heart. This wasn’t supposed to happen. He wasn’t supposed to find out about Jimmy like this. He wasn’t supposed to read that letter until she had explained the past couple weeks to him.

No, not merely a couple weeks. A month. It had been an entire month (and a little extra) since Jimmy first contacted her, and Rose hadn’t said a single word about it to James. Shit.

“I was going to tell you,” she said weakly. “I just…”

“Just hid it from me by accident, did you?” he said, condescension dripping from his every word.

Rose clenched her fists and her jaw before coldly replying, “I didn’t realize I needed your permission to talk to anybody, or that I needed to tell you about every person I talk to. Sorry, d’you want to know about the bloke I chatted to while I was waiting for you in the library today? Wanna know about the girl I met at work ‘cos she’d recently broken up with her girlfriend and needed to talk to someone? Wanna know about…”

She knew she was being ridiculous but she couldn’t make herself stop until James interrupted her.

“Of course you don’t need to tell me about everyone you talk to.” Two pink stains spread across his cheeks. “But I would have hoped you would have trusted me enough to tell me when your ex-boyfriend, the ex-boyfriend you claimed to despise, contacts you!”

Rose crossed her arms in front of herself, gripping the fabric of her sweatshirt so tightly that her fingertips began to ache. “This isn’t about trust, James.”

“No? Well, it sure seems like it is. Because you don’t actually trust me, do you? Not nearly to the extent that I trust you. I’ve shared everything with you, Rose. Everything! I told you about the worst night of my life. How it still haunts me and gives me nightmares like I’m a child again rather than a grown man. But you…”

He flapped his arms wildly before letting them fall limply to his sides, clearly out of words. But he didn’t need any more words; the ones he’d hurled at her hit their mark, cracking her heart wide open. He didn’t think she trusted him?

Suddenly wanting him to hurt as much as she did, she met his eye and said, “I didn’t make you share any of that with me. You did that on your own. You opening up to me doesn’t mean I’m obligated to do the same to you.”

It happened almost in slow motion, the way his face crumpled. The way his chin wobbled and his lips parted slightly with a soft, nearly inaudible, “Oh.” The way a crinkle formed between his brows, and beneath them, his eyes grew shiny with moisture.

Shit. Shit shit shit!

“James, I…” I’m sorry… I didn’t mean that…

His throat bobbed as he swallowed thickly, then his face smoothed into a mask of a person she didn’t recognize. Even before they became friends, when he was the random cute bloke sitting in front of her in their chemistry class, he exuded more warmth than he did right now.

“How silly of me to expect some level of reciprocity in this relationship,” he said coolly.

“I didn’t mean that, James,” she muttered, wringing her hands in front of herself. “Really. I didn’t. I’m sorry. I just… I didn’t want you to find out like this. I wanted to tell you the whole thing. I was going to tell you all about it, I swear.”

He barked out a laugh, and it was one of the worst noises she’d ever heard. “Oh, yeah? When were you gonna drop that one? When we’re old and gray in rocking chairs in a nursing home? ‘Darling, remember when we were first dating? Remember that horrible ex-boyfriend I had? He texted me—ha! Remember when texting was all the rage?’ Exactly when were you planning to tell me?”

Any sympathy she had for him had evaporated and her rage returned with a vengeance.

“Obviously if you’re acting like this, I was right to not tell you! Why are you being so unreasonable?”

“Unreasonable? Unreasonable?! My girlfriend has been texting the bloke she used to be in love with, and I’m being unreasonable?”

“Yes, you are! So what if I was texting him? What does it matter who I text on my own bloody phone?”

“You’re missing the entire bloody point!” he shouted, his voice cracking. “I’m not angry that you’re texting him…”

“Clearly,” she grumbled, grinding her teeth together.

“…I’m angry that you felt the need to keep it a secret,” he continued as though she hadn’t interrupted. “And I’m upset because why did you keep it a secret? And what on earth could you two have been talking about if he sent you this… this…” James flapped his hands uselessly to the table and the notebook under which Jimmy’s letter sat. “...this love letter?! For all I bloody know, you could be wanting to get back together with him and…”

“No, don’t you dare,” Rose hissed, voice trembling. Tears of fury and heartbreak burned behind her eyes, blurring her vision. “Don’t you fucking dare accuse me of that. After everything I told you about Jimmy—and don’t tell me I haven’t told you anything. Just because you seem to have selective memory doesn't mean I never told you about his drinking and partying, and how he stopped paying his half of the bills, and how he manipulated me to always feel badly about myself. After everything I told you, how could you even think I would want to go back to him?”

A flash of guilt appeared in James’s eyes. He blinked and lowered his gaze, staying silent.

“Even if he hadn’t treated me like shit, how could you take away everything you and I have done together? Everything we’ve built together? How could you think I would leave us behind for someone I fell out of love with years ago?” She sniffled as her tears finally fell, streaking down her cheeks in hot, wet rivulets of grief and misery. “Do you think that little of me? That I would willingly go back to a relationship like that when what we have is so wonderful? Do you think so little of us?”

James scrubbed his fingers through his hair, making a tousled mess of the limp and somewhat greasy strands; they were in dire need of a wash.

“No. No, of course I don’t…”

“You just said so,” she argued, impatiently wiping her face dry. “You just said…”

“I didn’t really mean it. But you have to understand… relationships are so new to me. You’re the longest relationship I’ve ever been in, and we��ve only been dating for four months. Christ, teenagers in school manage to have longer relationships than this. How pathetic am I for being so illiterate when it comes to love and romance? I barely know what I’m doing half the time, and God knows if I’ve been mucking this all up but you’re too nice to tell me…”

Rose’s head was spinning as her heart fought to beat its way out of her chest. She’d heard this before… she’d heard this all far too many times.

I didn’t mean it; I just drank too much…

You’re remembering wrong, I didn’t say it like that…

You’re being ridiculous. Calm down and maybe we can talk like normal people…

I was so drunk I don’t remember doing that…

I’m the worst piece of shit, Rosie, and I’m sorry, please forgive me…

She shook her head as though she could physically shake Jimmy’s voice out of her ears. Instead, she tried to focus on James’s words rather than map them on top of Jimmy’s.

“This is me telling you now that you are mucking this up…”

But James continued on as though she hadn’t spoken. And with how dry her mouth had become, she wasn’t sure if her words had been audible.

“...And you could be wanting to be in a relationship with someone who’s got a bloody clue as to what they’re doing. Why wouldn’t you prefer to be in a relationship with someone else…?”

“Because I love you, you stupid fucking arsehole!” Rose yelled, which caught his attention. He met her eyes and blinked slowly, as though confused. As though she were revealing a secret he’d never been privy to. “Yes, I love you, but you knew this! At least, I thought you did. I love you so much but you are breaking my heart, James. Haven’t you believed me these last four months?”

His mouth worked wordlessly for a few long and agonizing seconds.

“I… yeah.” His tone suggested otherwise, though, and she nearly began crying with frustration. All this time… all these months… Had none of it been real? Had he been pretending this whole time?

“Thanks for that vote of confidence.” She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes until bright lights burst behind her closed lids. “Thanks a lot, James.”

“I just…” He groaned, sounding as miserable as she felt. Good. “I’m so bloody new at this! I’m making it all up as I go and I’m worried I haven’t been doing a good job. I get nervous that one day you’re going to wake up and realize how rubbish I am at this. That you’ll get sick of holding my hand through all of this as I learn. I’m terrified you’re going to decide you’re done wasting your time with me, because you’re wonderful, and you deserve the best and I…”

“Stop!” Rose cried, a sob stealing the air from her lungs. “I don’t want to hear this. You have just… broken everything we’ve been building, James.” She hiccupped on another sob and impatiently sucked in a lungful of air. “We were supposed to be partners… I wanted us to be partners… I thought we were partners. We were supposed to be equals in this relationship. I don’t want you to put me up on a bloody pedestal, or for you to talk down about yourself or make excuses for yourself. I don’t want there to be this… this inequality between us for the rest of our lives. But if that’s always how it’s gonna be… if that’s how you’re always going to see us, as you being somehow lesser than me…” The force of her tears made her entire body shake. It felt like someone had blown a hole through her chest; she couldn’t breathe. “…then I don’t think we can make this work.”

The tears that had been threatening in James’s eyes fell down his pale cheeks. “What? Rose…?”

She buried her face in her hands, willing herself to calm down. But how could she be calm when it felt like the world was spinning too fast? James had been her tether, her anchor, keeping her grounded to the surface. But he’d let go, or maybe she had, and now she was crashing alone through the void. Lost. Adrift.

“You… are you breaking up with me?” His voice was so hoarse that she could hardly hear it. Though that might have been because her pulse was thudding in her ears instead.

Was she breaking up with him?

“I don’t… no… yes? I don’t know. I don’t want to. God, I don’t want to.” She swallowed the thick lump in her throat. “I love you more than I’ve loved anyone. And right now, that really bloody scares me. I fought so hard, put up with so much, to make things with Jimmy work when I should have called it quits long before it all ended. And I didn’t love him nearly as much as I love you. I’m terrified about what I’ll let happen… what I’ll excuse… I can’t do that again, James. I won’t do that again.”

He reached out for her, but she couldn’t let him touch her. She couldn’t feel his fingers on any part of her body. Not right now.

She raised her hands in front of herself and retreated a pace, nearly tripping over her shoes from where she’d kicked them off at the door.

The door.

With trembling fingers, Rose undid the deadbolt. “I- I want you to leave now.”

“No, wait,” he pleaded, raw urgency in his voice. But he didn’t come any closer to her. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Rose. I didn’t mean… I didn’t mean anything… I didn’t mean… I didn’t… Please…”

She’d never heard James, her eloquent, loquacious James, struggle this much for words. His eyes grew wild the longer he went without managing a sentence.

“Please,” he repeated, frantic. “Please, Rose. Don’t do this.”

She drew in a shuddering breath and closed her eyes. It was late, and she was so bloody exhausted. She didn’t want to be having this conversation anymore, but she knew it was far from over.

“I need a break,” she said wearily. “I’m tired, James. I’m so tired.”

“We can’t leave it like this,” he rasped through a stifled sob. “Please.”

Rose met his gaze. Everything was written on his face, his grief and terror and heartbreak. He looked impossibly young.

“We’re taking a break for the night,” she repeated. She paused for a beat, then, scrambling for some sort of comic relief, quipped, “Not Ross and Rachel’s version of a break, mind. A time out, more like.”

James either didn’t process the joke or didn’t find it funny, because he was still staring at her with that stricken expression that made her want to wrap him in her arms and apologize for everything that had been said that night.

But she couldn’t make herself move.

“I love you, Rose,” he whispered.

“I know.” That’s why this is so damn painful. “I love you too.” Maybe too much.

Rose had always thought of their love as a fire. A soft, cozy fire, and together they basked in its light and warmth. But maybe they’d gotten too comfortable, gotten too confident, gotten too close; now they were burning, and oh, God, did it hurt.

“Goodnight James,” she murmured, opening the door for him.

He numbly walked towards it, completely forgetting about his phone, keys, and wallet on her table until she went and picked them up. His hands were cold and sweating as she handed him his things.

“Drive safe,” she said. “Text me when you make it home.”

He made a wordless noise she thought was assent, then he was gone, walking silently down the many flights of steps they’d cheerfully bounded up mere moments earlier.

God, how long had it even been? It felt like an entire lifetime had passed. Rose glanced at the clock. 11:58. Sixteen minutes. Sixteen horrible, heartbreaking minutes was all it had taken for Rose’s world to come crashing down around her feet.

She went to her window and peered down at the dark street, waiting. Half a minute later, James stepped out from beneath the front porch of her building and ambled slowly to his car. He moved as though through treacle, as though he were tugging an invisible weight behind himself.

She continued watching him, but James simply sat there in his car in the dark. The clock switched over to 12:00, ringing in April twenty-seventh. She’d planned to kiss him at midnight, as though it were New Year’s Eve, and tell him that he could finally wish her a Happy Birthday.

All of a sudden, her game of keeping her birthday a secret wasn’t fun anymore, and twenty-two didn’t look as optimistic as it had been.

The distant purr of an engine drew her attention to the street below. James had started his car and was pulling away from the curb, taking off down the empty street.

Rose fully gave in to the sorrow she had been fighting back for the past quarter of an hour. Sinking down onto her couch, she bent double over her knees and sobbed her heart out, grieving for all that had shattered that night, and for the unanswerable question of whether broken things could be ever mended.

#ficandchips #doctorroseprompts #dwfic #doctor who #ten x rose #ten x rose au #james x rose #university au #romance #angst #hurt/comfort #my fic #chemical reaction #catalysis series #chemical potential sequel

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slippinmickeys · 5 years ago

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Of the Eight Winds, Part 8

This is the last chapter (there will be an epilogue) from the prompt from @sunflowerseedsandscience : “Mulder is unhappily married when Scully is partnered with him, and while he doesn’t cheat (because sorry that’s not romantic), he falls for her so hard that he finally gets the courage to end the marriage and start fresh.”

Links to parts one, two, three, four, five, six, and seven.

He wanted to go to Scully’s door the second he left the courtroom after his divorce was finalized but it felt sordid, fast. He needs to try to be on his own, live in his own head, if only for a few weeks, months. The thing is, needs and wants are two different things.

They took a few out of state cases, and one local one. He discovered that she had a cat.

Skinner sent her to the West Coast and after three days, he decided he was done waiting.

His divorce was final and their coupling was imminent. She could feel the inevitable slide toward him like she was teetering on a hillside, his pull as inexorable as gravity.

They were tentative and shy with each other in the office, and the whole waiting thing felt as stupid as it felt necessary. She had to wait until he came to her. The weeks grinded on, a weight pressing onto her.

Skinner asked her for a consult and so she flew west. With every mile that passed below her, something unclenched around her heart, so by the time she pulled into the small parking lot of the Santa Barbara Field Office, she felt an insouciant lightness.

The local SAC was a woman, and they formed an instant rapport. On her last night, Agent Fielding took her to a small tasting room just off the beaten path and they got tipsy on the local Pinot Noir and shared trench stories from the field and Quantico.

“I had this one case,” Fielding said, draining the last of her glass, “where the local Sheriff called the two other male agents working the case ‘Special Agent,’ but insisted on calling me ‘Miss.’”

Scully gave an exaggerated eye roll.

“Exactly,” Fielding went on, “Finally, I told him if he was going to call me miss, he’d better use my last name along with it, and when he asked what it was, I told him it was ‘Andry.’”

“Oh no,” Scully said.

“Oh yes. That fucker called me Miss Andry for the better part of a week and had no clue.”

They both laughed.

“Tell me about your partner,” Fielding said, running her fingers over the rim of her glass.

“Mulder?” Scully said, “He’s never treated me as anything but an equal.”

“So he’s a good one, huh?”

“The best,” Scully said, missing him suddenly.

As if they shared a heart, her cell phone chirped from her pocket.

It was after midnight on the East Coast.

“Mulder, everything okay?” she said, holding up a finger to Fielding, who watched with interest.

“I miss you,” he said, point blank, “when are you coming home?”

She could feel her cheeks color, adrenaline dumping into her bloodstream.

“Tomorrow,” she said. Tomorrow is a Friday.

“Tomorrow,” he said, the word imbued with implication. They both hung up.

“One of those good ones,” Fielding said, wearing a knowing smile.

Scully nodded, returned the smile. He was.

When she flew back east, his pull was as strong as the jet stream, and everything about the air was verging, each breath in; anticipation, each breath out; hope.

Two weeks in and she didn’t know what she’d been expecting, but it wasn’t this. This kind of sex was as desperate as it was sweet; pure and carnal and sybaritic. They’d scarcely left the bed in two days and she was certain by Monday she’d barely be able to walk.

She stared at her reflection, at her bee-stung lips, the beard burn scrape along her throat. It was 7:00am, time for her contraceptive. She’d gotten on the pill a month ago, and even as she understood the science, she has the urge to take two, just in case—she’d never had so much sex in her life.

Pop it through the foil, water from the faucet. She let it drip onto her bare chest from her chin.

When she got back into bed, Mulder, newly awake, reached for her.

“Is there a word for this?” he whispered to her, his nose pressing into her neck, his erection into her thigh.

“Satyriasis,” she said clinically, and he huffed a laugh into her skin.

“I knew you’d know,” he said.

She rolled to face him.

“I was thinking we could just call it love,” she said, and she saw emotion reach his eyes.

He gave her a tiny, serious nod.

They investigated a mercenary rainmaker in a drought-stricken Midwestern town and encountered a force more powerful than the weather. Here was a man who may love a woman with more passion and devotion than he loved Scully. He was humbled before him; a man with the improbable name of Holman Hardt.

When Holman came to him for advice, he gave it freely. Yes, he was in love with Agent Scully. There was a reason for the mutual gazing. He told him how he had been married to someone else but had been in love with her for five years before he had the courage to end his marriage and tell Scully how he felt. He encouraged Holman to do the same.

“If you love her,” Mulder said, growing emotional despite the ridiculousness of the entire case, “Holman, you gotta tell her.”

Holman marched to Sheila’s office and kissed her soundly.

The happy couple invited him and Scully to join them at their high school reunion, and they surprised themselves by accepting.

They danced to 10CC and The Hues Corporation and they drank watered down cocktails and made out in a high school hallway.

When they flew out the next day, the clouds--every last one from here into the horizon—were in the shape of hearts.

“There’s a place I want to show you,” he said, “get dressed.”

He hauled on jeans and had to lift up Blackwell to find his other sock, which she’d been using as a pillow.

He’d been wanting to broach the topic of moving in together for months, though when he’d asked her five minutes ago, he did so casually, like he’d only just thought of it.

When they pulled up to 42 Magnolia Avenue in Alexandria, Scully looked over at him, confused.

“Mulder, what is this?” she asked.

The house was gorgeous. It was a two-level, craftsman-inspired behemoth with a large two car garage and a deep front yard. There were twin magnolia trees on the front of the property, and while the yard was shaded, it got lots of light.

“It’s an Open House,” he said, not quite lying.

“Mulder, we could never afford this,” she said, looking at the neighboring houses. This was a neighborhood of lobbyists, congressmen, even. The lots were large, beautiful, and so were the homes.

“So?” he said, stepping out of the car, “we’ll get an idea of what we like.”

She looked dubious, but got out of the car, too.

When they got to the front door, the realtor opened it and gave Mulder a nod.

“Welcome,” she said, “come on in and take a look around.”

“Wow,” Scully said, impressed. The foyer wasn’t overly large, but was big enough for bench seating and and had a decent sized closet. But what was beyond the foyer seemed to have grabbed her attention. It opened up to a large open concept living room that rolled into an impressive kitchen. The appliances were new and stainless steel. There was a fireplace in the corner and a large bay window that looked out over a spacious back yard dotted with dogwoods and lined with large trees.

After touring the upstairs (“Blackwood would love the sun in that third bedroom,” she said “and that master bath is lovely,”) she came to stand in front of the big window in the living room, looking out over the back. The realtor was standing in the kitchen with her arms behind her back and a confident smile on her face.

“So,” Mulder said, coming up behind her, “can you see yourself living in a house like this?”

“Only if I’d married that thoracic surgeon,” she said wistfully, stepping into him and smiling into his chin.

“Is that a yes?” Mulder said.

“It’s a yes,” she said, tilting her head back, “this house is perfect. Maybe it’ll be up for sale in another 20 years when I’m running the Bureau.”

Mulder turned to the realtor.

“What do you think, Marie? Could you see us in this house 20 years from now?”

“And beyond,” Marie said, with a pleased smile.

Mulder nodded at her and she nodded back, stepping out into the foyer and closing the front door behind her softly.

“Mulder?” Scully said, giving him a look, “what’s going on?”

“I’m glad you like the house, Scully,” he said, leaning down to give the end of her nose a gentle peck, “it’s yours.”

Despite the huge fight it had caused, he was glad he had gone ahead with the pre-nup with Lauren. The money he’d inherited from his maternal grandmother had finally been put to good use.

Scully’s brows were creased in confusion.

“Both of our names are on the deed,” he said, “it’s just waiting for your signature. Marie has it out in her car.”

In Winston-Salem, she would not leave his bedside. He was her medical puzzle to solve and she left the policing to Skinner. Weaver, Drs. Voss and Scobie, even the malevolent Morley Tobacco Company, none of them mattered. Eventually, she figured it out, and Mulder was saved.

It wasn’t until nearly a week later that she looked at her birth control pack and realized that the days did not line up. Somewhere in North Carolina, she lost track of time.

Scully was waiting on a bench outside of the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History when he pushed Lily up in the stroller. The baby was making fretting noises, just on the verge of all-out tears. She stood when they approached.

“Hey you two, everything go okay?”

Mulder nodded and kicked the brake on the stroller, lifting the muslin blanket he’d had draped over the top of the bassinet compartment.

“Someone’s getting hungry,” he said, and Scully reached in and pulled Lily out, sitting down on the bench and unhooking the strap of her nursing bra.

Mulder dug a hand deep into the pocket of his jeans as if checking for change before he sat down next to her. Lily latched on and began to nurse. He reached out and tucked a piece of hair behind Scully’s ear.

“Is Lauren okay?” Scully asked kindly.

He leaned back, surveying the mall behind the Smithsonian.

“She’s good,” he said.

“I’m glad.”

He felt a sense of peace descend on him. A part of him had always felt responsible for the bad years with Lauren--he should have never asked her to marry him in the first place. To see her happy and light brought him a lightness, too.

His father died when Lily was 15 and William was 12. The whole of the Scully/Mulders packed up for a week and drove up to Massachusetts.

His mother met them there from Raleigh, looking frail. There was a dowager’s hump starting to form on her spine and her hair looked thin and impossibly white. Looking at his father’s casket, he felt all of his fifty-five years.

He recognized nearly everyone at the wake, but there was a woman lingering over the cheese plate that looked out of place, but he couldn’t put his finger on why. When he approached her, she drifted away ahead of him and he was about to search for her in earnest when Scully grabbed him by the arm.

“I’m going to take the kids down to the beach, give them a little reprieve from Aunt Edna asking about Tinder.”

He nodded, kissed her cheek.

He was grabbed by a distant cousin as soon as Scully left his side, and was caught in small talk for the next forty five minutes.

“You’re… you’re what?” he asked, certain he didn’t hear right. He’d been expecting the worst.

“Pregnant,” she said again, and for a moment he was too stunned by the reversal. Then it dawned on him that it was not bad news. That it was traditionally good news.

He grabbed her face in both hands and bent his knees until his face was level with hers.

“Holy shit ,” he said, practically laughing. He flashed on the moment he found out she was pregnant with Lily and felt a kind of synergy.

“You’re happy?” she asked, hedging.

“I’m… are you ?”

“I’m stunned,” she said, “after Will was born…”

Mulder remembered her slick hand in his, her white-knuckled grip when Dr. Wong told them she would no longer be able to conceive.

He dropped to his knees before her, put his hands on her hips, his forehead over her womb. After a moment he leaned back.

“We got rid of all our baby stuff,” he said.

“We did,” she said.

“We specifically had a garage sale to get rid of it.”

“Yes.”

“Our hoity-toity neighbors were really irritated by the whole thing.”

“They were.”

“We’re going to have to buy all new stuff,” he said, his enthusiasm starting to wane.

“We are,” she said, “though the safety stuff would be expired now, anyway.”

The wheels were spinning in Mulder’s head. They would have to start a whole new college fund.

Scully grabbed his hands and sunk down to sit next to him.

“I was afraid you were going to be upset,” she finally said.

He gave her a look and squeezed her hand.

“Never,” he said, and she nodded, believing him.

“I warn you now, if you bring up my age in relation to this pregnancy, I will handcuff you to the pipes in the basement.”

Mulder pursed his lips, huffed out one small laugh.

“Don’t threaten me with a good time, Scully,” he said.

She shook her head, tipped it until it was leaning on his shoulder.

“Do you really think we can do this again?” she asked him earnestly.

He grabbed both sides of her face and they connected eyes.

“You might be the skeptic here, Scully,” he said, “me? I’m the believer.”

#the X-Files #fanfiction #fanfic #MSR #AU #Of the Eight Winds #my fic

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sa7abnews · 5 months ago

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Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC, offers new interactive exhibit on worship

New Post has been published on https://sa7ab.info/2024/08/09/museum-of-the-bible-in-washington-dc-offers-new-interactive-exhibit-on-worship/

Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC, offers new interactive exhibit on worship

The Museum of the Bible in the nation’s capital has opened a new exhibit that is offering a dive into the past, present and future of worship. Titled “All Creation Sings,” the exhibit offers an interactive worship experience that is designed to “enlighten” guests by sharing the diversity, development and history of the practice of worship, according to museum staff.Garrett Hinton, chief revenue officer at the Museum of the Bible, told Fox News Digital in an emailed statement that worship is more than just “the thing that we do at church on Sundays before the pastor gets up and gives the sermon.”GARDENS OUTSIDE PARIS MAKE SPECTACULAR IMPRESSION ON TOURISTS AS FLOWERS TURN HEADS AND CALM SOULS”As the Bible talks about worship, it’s so much more than that. So the story is the story of the Bible — and it’s taking you from Creation or Genesis all the way to Revelation,” said Hinton.The name of the experience comes from Psalm 148.”Let them praise the name of the Lord: for his name alone is excellent; his glory is above the earth and heaven.””All Creation Sings” takes museum visitors through four different parts, answering the question, “What is worship?”The first act begins by recounting the story of creation.”Worship is our purpose. That’s what we’re created for. So, God created us, and he created our universe. That’s where it all starts,” said Matthias Walther, chief marketing officer at the Museum of the Bible.”And I think to discover this — to see the greatness of our Creation, the greatness of God’s design in our existence — it takes you to a humble, really reflective place.” TRAVEL HOTSPOTS INCLUDE 5 QUIRKY MUSEUMS CELEBRATING BARBERSHOPS, MUSTARDS, SPUDS, SPAM AND SUPERHEROESAct two explores “the development of the art of worship and its expression through numerous media,” according to the press release.The third act highlights the power of scripture, detailing how the Bible shapes lives and societies.Finally, the last act will help guests imagine “the future reality where all creation participates in joyful worship.”The 6,500-square-foot exhibit is using innovative equipment such as scanning technology, projectors and responsive software to help guests worship as never before, the museum says.CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR OUR LIFESTYLE NEWSLETTER”This virtual reality experience offers an exciting tour of some of the most famous biblical sites,” the museum notes on its website. “This state-of-the-art attraction allows [visitors] to soar across the Sea of Galilee, climb the stairs to the Temple Mount, explore the path of the good Samaritan and visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre during midnight services.”For more Lifestyle articles, visit foxnews.com/lifestyleThe museum partnered with CREATR, an on-demand class that gives users access to creative and worship voices in the church, educating them on worship, songwriting, creativity, leadership and more.”The idea of ‘All Creation Sings’ is that often people refer to worship as the 20-25 minutes of the songs being sung at Sunday service, but what we really wanted to do was open people’s eyes to see that worship is far more than that,” said Dylan Thomas, CREATR CEO and co-founder in a statement. The Museum of the Bible is offering free entry to visitors after 3 p.m. during the month of July.Anyone can learn more at museumofthebible.org.

#a23c453d-fcf4-5234-a3d1-827994818d1e

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dansedan · 4 years ago

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digging through stuff to submit to a writing contest, so here are two original short stories written about a year apart which I’m still generally proud of!

That Which Flesh Is Heir To

Death

The word seemed funny, coming out of her dainty mouth. She seemed too small, her voice too high-pitched in attempted formality. Her German thick with effort. It was one of the major themes of religious art across Europe at the time, she said. She waved her thin arms around her with every word, a little too excitedly, as if using a conductor’s meter to elicit some response from our group. Fear of death was useful to the church: for the sake of convincing the uneducated masses to maintain faith, and to benefit from the guilt of nobles, since their main role then was still in warfare.

Our class was moving on, the teacher rounding up stragglers and signaling the entrance to the next hall. It was filled with statues and paintings and marble, floor to ceiling wrapped in colors much like this one. My feet refused to obey her order, standing instead unflinchingly in front of the statue. In front of her. I couldn’t bear to move my gaze from the figure’s eyes, blank and hollow, despairing. The world blurred around the single point of bitter fate ensconced in marble.

Do you want to see something interesting? I hadn’t expected her to address me. She had moved now- we were side by side- giving off warmth from the proximity of her bare shoulders to my arm. I forced myself to nod, and felt a movement, something stiff and hot against my ear- something plastic. I like to listen to it, sometimes, she was saying, so close to me. It reminds me of this statue. Her fingers brushed the shell of my ear. It was Mozart, and the soft wailing choral voices seemed to echo my emotions as her fingers wilted back into her hand and away from me.

We stood there for a moment, lost in the crowd of museumgoers. An island in their midst, and in that second all I could think was do not let this go. This feeling, this fire in the pit of your stomach, this hollow feeling in your chest that’s rising to your head do not let this go. The violins and chorus and the marble. The cherubs in the vaulted ceiling smiling down with knowing, cruel smiles. Her collarbone and silver band across her chest do not let them go. The chatter of the crowd- Italian and Spanish and Croatian or Dutch. Do not let them go. Not for one second of your life. Do not forget this.

And I felt her press into my side, and touch my shoulder gently. She was whispering into my chest it’s alright, let it out it’s alright I’ve done it too. It’s helped me too, I’ve done it too let it out. I’ve cried here too, I’ve done this too. I feel it too. And as she held me I was shaking. Please do not forget this. Do not let this go.

All that flesh makes willing

Our affair was brief- I was a tourist- but she was beautiful, and cold only in the literal sense common for women of her stature. A thin white thing, like the marble she’d been surrounded with at work. Chestnut hair draped across her shoulders, to the collarbone- I’d never till then comprehended why dress codes, in my country, called to cover the collarbone. I could (and often did) end up staring at her for hours, willing her to be my muse, to make me make something, but she was so pragmatic that she often ended all of these discussions by smiling (I could hear it in her voice, the smiling) and requesting some menial favor. “could you please buy cigarettes”, or “pass me the salt-shaker”, or “isn’t it late now?”, anything. But she was beautiful, so I did it for her, anyhow. And so it happened that by the end of the three months stay I’d agreed upon with my agent for the residence the only thing I’d made from her was a larger pile of laundry and a couple embarrassing purchases- underwear, linens, whatever. And even in the final moments, at the train station, she only smiled and said good-bye and told me not to drift off when I was travelling alone, that the front of the train was still dangerous. And she smiled small and nodded sternly as she walked away, foot over unbearable foot blending together in an undulating gesture. And I stood there, dumb and half-blind (the irony) with agony but not saying anything, and eventually I checked my watch and it said it was midnight when I’d almost missed my ticket and got stranded (sometimes I wish I’d allowed that, then. Walked back to her apartment and killed her with kisses, refused to leave. But I was too pragmatic and my rent was due a couple days and I never understood how visas worked) and I made it in by running and forsook her wisdom, sleeping straight to Britain with only a couple minutes of half-lucid awareness where I denied wet towels and assistance transferring train cars.

It was only several months later that I let myself remember her, thick on the tail of another woman as I usually was, reminiscing my journeys from that summer until I suddenly stumbled upon those moments where we’d pressed together, where her smallness met the empty vast of my own hollowed chest and we breathed light the night into the daybreak. And at this memory I at once ached, and softly sighed around my daily life for days again without reprieve, reprimanding myself for forgetting her so quickly, as one does when stirred from sleep when dreams handcrafted by your mind so soon escape you. When the London rain was blue and humid bog-warm I would pace around the city with my coat on wandering. As if I could find her this way somehow. After weeks then I resolved I’d make her- as I was still convinced she had been my muse then- and conscripted through some not insignificant haggling the help of a dear friend to trot to the museum one brief moment to peruse their own swathe of Roman marble as material.

“So you bedded some Italian and now you can’t get over it- what’s with the statues?”

“We met at the museum”

“’The Museum’,” she said mockingly. “You were in Italy, Eva, which bloody museum?”

“The statue-room at the Uffizi”

“there’s more than-“

“she’s the guide there- speaks ten languages. She’s so clever…” I wondered ‘round the room. Bright blue walls surrounded the bright stone figures, seeming almost like a classroom round. “She was beautiful, Hannah.”

She stood still by the entrance- we were alone, and it was all quite quiet, a weekday near the start of June drew little people here. For a few tentative steps, her boots clacked loudly on the tile.

“…how did you meet her anyway?”

“Well, she’s the tour guide.”

“Well most people don’t shag the tour guide, genius.”

We were standing, shoulder-shoulder facing Venus in the corner of the rounded hall. Rather striking, must be- pair of stone-hard lezzies facing just that goddess. Hannah’s fuzz-buzz haircut and her stiff-wool coverall next to my own shaggy hair and rounded shades indoors. My sight-cane stuck to my Martens, clacking with my tics and movements (base-floor-base-floor-base-floor-base-floor).

“Well there was this pair of wrestlers, and I suppose she pegged me just the type then, looking at them close.”

“ah. Gotta love the Romans.”

“She’s so clever. Did you know she knew the story behind all the statues even, all about the burial sites and everything?”

“M’pretty sure they’re trained to do that”

“but she was clever. She’s really clever.”

“Jolly good then.”

I had to turn then- same comforting brown-orange smudge of longtime friendship as was usual- grab at her elbows till we were close enough to see the limits of her own round ruddy face.

“Hannah dear, I think I love her.”

“I think you’re spitting on me, Eva.” And she grabbed my shoulders playfully and pinched them tight within her plush palms. “and that you probably need to shag someone else and get back on your medicine.”

“you don’t get it, she was beautiful. She was-“ and here I very grandly gestured to the marble next to us, taking a risk and hoping we were still next to the Venus somehow since I’d lost my footing on how many steps inside I’d taken (and taking a risk that I’d maybe slap a piece of ancient history in the process). “prettier than this one, even.”

And Hannah was silent, because she knew better than to mention my blindness, and I dreaded to feel her being right about something I felt so strongly on.

“you don’t…her collarbone- she’s just. So pretty, so-” I hate my blubbering- this small pathetic schoolchild voice I make all suddenly- but soon her arm was back on my shoulder and she was moving close so I could see orange and grey in us fuzzing together, feel her strong arm on my back and nape. And she said “ alright, I believe you” and “let’s just get you home now” and we did, gone on the underground riding all the way together although she lived in Surrey and was supposedly only visiting for the day, and she sat in my apartment with the kettle on while I dragged a canvas out of the storage and started glopping color on it, thinking of the nearness of her face in the warm green summer nights of Florence then. Until I tired myself out at night and we just sat still staring at the wall with it, sharing cups of lukewarm grocery-bag tea with no sugar in and staring, staring, staring long and hard and in remembrance. And I wasn’t sure if that’s what she looked like because it had been so long and such a distance. And I felt then perhaps her smile sounded different to the painting, but Hannah spoke after a while of silence saying, “beautiful she is, then.” And that moment I felt fine and shut the door again on feelings- like at the train station back then- and melted into the naked brown of my friend’s shoulder, soft and dark and oaken-sure. And I willed me to forget myself.

#my writing

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sunkissedpages · 6 years ago

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sunkissedpages masterlist

“You shouldn’t write if you can’t write.” -Ernest Hemingway

Well here I am, bitch.

💦 = nsfw (18+) minors dni you will be blocked

✦ match his freak 💦

your husband’s attempt at getting you to stay in bed with him

✦ We’re Only Kidding Ourselves COMPLETE (oct. 19)

You work as a production assistant for the Spider-Man: Far From Home crew, or rather as Tom Holland’s handler. The two of you don’t get along very well to say the least, but you won’t quit and he can’t fire you so you’re stuck with each other.

✦ Breaking Curfew COMPLETE (jul. 20)

When you got the job to be a counselor at the summer camp you’d grown up attending all your life, you expected to see some familiar faces. But you certainly hadn’t counted on having to work alongside the boy who had made it his life’s mission to make your life a living hell every summer. In fact, you thought you’d never have to see Tom Holland again. But he’s is in the cabin right across from yours with campers of his own- smirk, jawline, and all. If you didn’t know any better you might’ve thought that he applied for the position just to spite you, but who were you kidding? What kind of asshole would do something like that?

✦ Instead of You (in progress)

You didn’t expect to spend your summer pretending to be your best friend’s girlfriend- then again, you didn’t expect to fall for your best friend’s brother, either.

✦ No Nut November 💦 (I’m a dumbass)

…..Tom takes the No Nut November bet with Harrison leaving you confused as to why he’s acting so strange. (2018 + 2019 + 2020 + 2021)

✦ Traditions with a Twist 🎄

Meeting Tom’s parents for the first time and spending the Holidays with them. (There’s also gingerbread house building lol)

✦Petals and Thorns

Tom always brings you flowers when he’s thinking of you, and you want to switch it up and return the favor. Sometimes you just have to treat your mans.

✦ Just Another Thursday Night

As far as commercial holidays went, Valentine’s Day was your least favorite. (My Valentine for @technicolor-lightning)

✦ In The Dark

a road trip with your boyfriend doesn’t exactly go as planned

✦ Midnight Delays

having a conversation across train platforms isn’t very practical

✦ Arm’s Length 💦

you’re sick. you’re supposed to go on the far from home press tour with tom, but you don’t want to get him sick. a compromise is made.

✦ 3 Nights 💦

a one-night hookup turns into three (based off of the song 3 nights by dominic fike )

✦ White Christmas 🎄

every year on christmas morning the hollands wear matching pajamas... yeah they’re one of those families

✦ The Method | The Method Pt II 💦

taking method acting to the next level

✦ Pretend 💦

reading thirst tweets with your co-star/boyfriend’s best friend makes things a little tense

✦ Dirty Reflection 💦

fulfilling a long held fantasy with your boyfriend (cockwarming him in front of a mirror)

✦ Desperate 💦

the first time tom fucks you raw (sponsored by irresponsible decisions)

✦ Something More 💦

it’s a tale as old as time- your roommate walks in on you masturbating and things escalate from there

✦ High-rise 💦

walking around your apartment naked has never been a problem, since you live in a high-rise and no one can see in, at least that's what you thought...

✦Bloodlust 💦

your vampire boyfriend drinks your blood for the first time :)

✦ Once Bitten 💦

locked in a museum until morning with a vampire that hates you is not how you imagined your night going

✦ Repent 💦

your one-night stand claims to be a vampire, but you’re just trying to get some dick

✦ Indulgence 💦

you and your boyfriend decide to try something new- aka letting his fraternity brothers watch him edge you (ft. harrison and some others)

✦ We Could Call it Even 💦🎄

(based off of ‘tis the damn season by taylor swift) running into someone you haven’t seen in years makes makes old feelings and nostalgia resurface just in time for christmas

✦ Right Now 💦

sleeping with tom for the first time is more intense than you anticipated

✦ and then some 💦

tom interrupts your date

✦ Under the Weather

You wake up sick one day, but avoid telling your boyfriend, Harrison because you know he’d leave work to take care of you.

✦ Late Night Resolutions

after a fight with Harrison you spend new year’s eve at a party without him where you end up breaking your nose.

✦ Sun Kissed 💦

more like sunburned. On vacation with Harrison you lay out on the beach for a little too long, making for a very interesting night.

✦ Andante, Andante 💦

when in greece... you lose your virginity to your best friend?? that’s how the saying goes, right??? (based off of the song andante, andante from mamma mia! here we go again)

BLURB MASTERLIST

HEADCANON MASTERLIST

MTL + REACTIONS

#wazzupmrstark masterlist #masterlist #tom holland #tom holland x reader #wazzupmrstark #harrison osterfield #harrison osterfeild x reader

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vernonfielding · 5 years ago

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Life Writes Its Own Stories

Chapter 9. (AO3)

By mutual agreement, they declared a ban on “fancy” dates, which were defined as anything requiring a tie (for him) or high heels (for her) or financial gymnastics (for both of them). “I just don’t think we’re that kind of couple,” Amy said. “I just don’t think I have more than a dollar in my bank account,” Jake said. He could tell she thought he was joking and he was disinclined to correct her, for the time being.

So they got creative.

Amy treated him to a picnic at their fountain in Prospect Park, with Italian subs from the deli that he said was his favorite but never went to because his third favorite was closer to the precinct.

She took him to the T-rex exhibit at the natural history museum and made out with him in a dim corner of the gem room, where they got caught by a trio of middle-schoolers on a field trip who followed them around the rest of the afternoon.

She dragged him to the button store near Bryant Park, so he could experience the insanity of an entire shop with nothing but buttons. She’d loved visiting the store as a child with her mother, she said to him, and just as she had when she was young, she filled a silky pouch with mismatched buttons, picked out by both of them. She told him to keep it, and he stuffed it in his sock drawer, then changed his mind and set it on his bedside table instead. On nights he wasn’t with her, he’d hold it in his hand while he messed around on his phone or watched TV; the slip and slide of the buttons through the cloth, the gentle clacking sound they made, was soothing to him.

Jake took her to his go-to thrift store for undercover attire, and made Amy buy clothes for her alter ego, Eldora Senegal, and he picked out something for Pineapples, and they wore their costumes to a shady bar near his apartment and day drank and fell asleep on his couch at 8 p.m. on a Saturday.

He led her on a midnight crime tour of Brooklyn, and the next morning he bought her breakfast sandwiches from the sketchy looking bodega across the street from his apartment, and she said they were the best she’d ever had.

He took her to a kids’ soccer game at Prospect Park, where they set up cheap folding chairs and shared a bag of peanuts and drank PBRs out of paper bags, and each of them picked a team – the winner got to control the TV for two weeks. They got aggressively, perhaps inappropriately, competitive, and in the lulls between plays, Jake told her about the one season he’d played soccer as a kid, after his dad had left and he’d quit Little League. And she didn’t look at him with pity or indulgence, just smiled softly and brushed her thumb over his cheek, then screamed at the goalie on her team for diving the wrong way on a shot.

Amy figured out pretty quickly that Jake was kind of a slob and that it was true she’d have to get used to him showing up late for dates or canceling last-minute when he got stuck on a case. Eventually he had to tell her about the crushing debt, when she gently suggested he might need a new mattress. Her eyes grew wide with alarm, and for the first time he felt he’d disappointed her and it was awful. But then the dismay on her face shifted to something more like fond exasperation – the same look when she saw the stacks of unwashed cereal bowls in his kitchen sink or when he showed up for dinner with his hair still wet from a precinct shower – and honestly, that wasn’t so bad.

Jake learned Amy was a terrible cook and a nerd about word games and kind of a control freak, and that she was prone to absurd bouts of stubbornness when she was having a bad day. He could always tell when the Times or some other newspaper had beat her on a story because she would refuse any help or small kindness from him for the rest of the day, even if it was just opening a door for her or offering to pick up takeout before coming over.

And he found that she’d meant it when she said her career was her priority, which wasn’t to say he ever felt pushed aside, or like she took him for granted. But she worked as many nights as he did, and though she didn’t often go into the newsroom on weekends she almost always had her police scanner on low at her apartment and she obsessively checked Twitter for breaking news.

“I have a new rule,” he said to her one lazy afternoon, as he came up behind her and pressed a kiss to the side of her neck. She was sitting at her kitchen table, working on the Sunday Times crossword puzzle; her phone sat next to the paper, buzzing at irregular intervals.

She angled her head to expose more of her neck and said, distracted, “What’s that?”

“Turn off Twitter notifications.”

She stiffened and looked over her shoulder at him. “Are you crazy?”

Jake sighed and sat next to her. “You’re making me a little crazy, Ames.”

She assessed him, eyes narrowed. “I’ll turn off 30 percent of the notifications.”

“Deal.” He leaned over and they kissed, a promise, and she turned back to her puzzle. “Also, no more scanner during sexy times.”

“Now you’ve gone too far, Peralta,” she said. But then she got up and turned off the scanner humming low in the corner, and straddled him in the chair. So yeah, he knew she had her priorities just right.

+++

A month after they started dating, they went to Gina’s dance recital in Queens, where they sat in the last row in the dark and whistled and cheered at her solo moves. When it was over they dropped off flowers for her with someone backstage but they didn’t stick around to say hi. Gina didn’t know they were dating, and Jake wasn’t entirely opposed to telling her, but he wasn’t sure how she would react, if she’d be angry or happy for him or just bored by the news.

A few days later, Jake was at Shaw’s with Rosa after an especially dumb day chasing scooter thieves – “We should just let them go, they’re doing the city a favor,” Jake said. “Yep,” Rosa said. They caught the guys two hours later – when someone called out “Jakey!”

He looked up and saw Amy at the same moment he spotted Charles, who was waving and pointing crazily at Jake. Amy’s jaw dropped and Jake was convinced for a second that he’d been roofied because it was the only way to explain these people all in one place at the same time. Then Rosa hit him.

“Dude, why is your girlfriend here?”

For a second Jake wasn’t sure if she was referring to Amy or Charles, but he knew Rosa would never make fun of someone’s masculinity and he felt bad about the thought even crossing his mind. “How did you know?”

“You’re super obvious,” Rosa said.

Then Charles and Amy had crossed the room and were standing at their table, and Charles was saying something about how he thought they’d be perfect together and he’d been trying to make this happen for so long and what did they think, was it a love connection? And Rosa said, “Shut up, man, they’re already dating.”

Charles looked wildly between them before his knees buckled and he fell into a chair that was conveniently just under him. Rosa pushed her beer across the table to him and he picked it up and finished it in one go.

“I’m Rosa,” Rosa said to Amy.

“Amy,” Amy said.

“I can’t believe this,” Charles said.

“Seriously, how do you know everyone I work with?” Amy sat down next to Jake and stole his beer.

It was like this, Jake told her: He’d met Charles five years ago, when Charles’ ex-wife had been holding his sperm hostage and Charles had filed a complaint, and the case had been too obviously insane for Jake to not take it. He’d known Charles’ job had something to do with editing but he hadn’t realized he worked at the Bulletin.

“How can you not know that?” Amy said.

“We kind of only ever talk about my job,” Jake said.

Charles nodded agreeably. “Jake’s work is way more interesting than mine.”

“Oh, and we talk about food. Super gross food.”

“Also true,” Charles said.

When Rosa got up to get more drinks and Charles got up to ask about the Shaw’s selection of balsam liqueurs (“None. I’m sure it’s none,” Jake told him, but Charles wanted to check anyway), Jake turned to Amy and kissed her, firm but fast, and said, “You need to get out of here.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry, I’m really sorry, but this is a cop bar and there are so many people watching us and-” He flapped his hand around weakly, because he didn’t want to have to say it.

“And you can’t be seen with me,” she finished for him.

It was too loud and too dark in the bar for him to read her, but his heart seized up at the words. “It’s not that I don’t want to-”

“Jake, it’s okay,” Amy said. She took his hand and squeezed it, then quickly let him go and stood. “I’ll grab Charles and get him to take me home. Call me later?”

She wasn’t even annoyed when he called that night, perched on the edge of his bed with his shoes still on, prepared to go to her if she was mad or upset or just sad.

“I get it,” she said.

He flopped back on his bed. “I don’t think I deserve you.”

She laughed and said he probably didn’t. “Also, you are definitely taking me and Rosa out to dinner soon and no, I don’t care about your debt, because I didn’t have time to win her over tonight,” Amy said.

Jake was too crazy about her to argue.

+++

The second weekend of November was cold and drizzly and gray, the perfect weather for staying inside all day with a week’s worth of notes to transcribe and catalogue and a man to send out for snacks as needed. But it was also the weekend that Amy was going to introduce Jake to her family, or some of them: David was having a barbecue at his Flatbush apartment.

They were swarmed within a few minutes of their arrival, and Jake was introduced to three of her seven brothers all at once, though he’d met some of them before, just not as their sister’s boyfriend.

And that was what she called him. “This is my boyfriend, Jake,” she said to Manny, the fourth brother in attendance, who was supervising the grill in the backyard (Amy was never not going to be annoyed that David had managed to find an affordable apartment in Brooklyn with an actual backyard). The “boyfriend” probably wasn’t necessary because she had her arm looped through Jake’s when she said it and she went up on her toes to kiss his cheek. But she liked saying it, and Jake beamed when he heard it.

“You’re with the Nine-Nine, right?” Manny reached out a hand to shake, then dug into the ice chest at his feet and handed over two Tecates. “Only the best for Amy and her boyfriend.”

Jake chuckled and popped open the beer, briefly tapping his can against Manny’s and Amy’s before taking a sip. “Isn’t it a little cold for a barbecue?”

“It’s fucking freezing, but David’s boyfriend asked for our mom’s pollo asado for his birthday, and Mom can’t resist David, so-”

“Wait, Mom’s here?” Amy said, her voice gone high-pitched as she looked all around the backyard.

“She’s in the kitchen. David didn’t tell you?” Manny sounded genuinely surprised, but Amy could tell by the look on his face that he found the situation hilarious.

“He did not,” Amy said, her grip tightening around Jake’s arm.

Jake was looking a little panicked but obviously trying not to show it. “Is your dad here too?”

Manny busted up laughing and slapped him on the shoulder. “No, man, you’re safe for tonight.” He nodded his head toward the house. “Go inside and talk to her, sis. I’ll keep Peralta occupied.”

Amy glanced at Jake and he gave her a small nod and a kiss on the forehead. She squeezed his arm and then let go, squared her shoulders, and walked toward the backdoor.

She hadn’t yet told her mom she was dating anyone, let alone a cop. Family politics such as they were, she was afraid that bringing an NYPD detective home was going to be instantly divisive, solidifying her place on Team Cop and firmly pitted against Team Not-Cops, which was led by Camila Santiago – loving mother of eight, champion of the people, and vice president of her neighborhood chapter of Black Lives Matter.

Bringing Jake to David’s barbecue had been a calculated move on Amy’s part. She’d counted on a gentle Santiago initiation, an opportunity for him to gain a few allies before meeting the rest of the family. Leave it to David to foil her plans, again.

She found him in the kitchen, chopping cilantro and singing along with a showtune she vaguely recognized. Amy hissed in his ear, “You did this on purpose.”

“Amita! You made it!”

Amy punched him in the arm. “Do not call me that, traitor.”

“Amy! My only daughter, come here.” Her mom crossed the kitchen and swept Amy in a hug, kissing both of her cheeks. She smelled faintly of garlic and chilis, and the floral-scented face powder she’d been using as long as Amy could remember.

“Mom, I’m sorry I haven’t called-”

“You’re very busy, I understand.” She held Amy at arm’s length, looking her up and down, and then peered over her shoulder toward the backyard. “David told me your boyfriend was coming.”

Amy could practically feel David smirking at them. “He’s in the backyard.” She took a deep breath and let it out all at once. “Mom, Jake’s a detective. In the NYPD.”

“So David said.”

“It wasn’t like I planned to date a cop, it just happened,” Amy said, in a rush. “I don’t want you to think I’m choosing sides. And I don’t want you to hate him. He’s really great, Mom. If you just give him a chance-”

But her mom was laughing. “Mija, I married a cop. And I happen to love your father very much.”

Amy stared, dumbstruck, because somehow that very important detail hadn’t occurred to her.

“Come,” her mother said, tucking her arm through Amy’s and steering them toward the backyard, “let’s go meet Jake.”

Amy smiled, and she wasn’t even annoyed – much – at the smug look on David’s face when she caught his eye. At the top of the stairs down to the yard, Amy’s mom stopped her and just looked her over again, long enough that Amy felt a blush rise to her cheeks.

“Mom?”

“I’m proud of you,” her mother said. “I know I don’t say it enough.”

Amy felt her eyes fill and didn’t trust herself to speak. Her mom stroked her hair, tugging a little at the ends, and said, “You need a haircut.” Amy laughed, and she pulled her mom forward to introduce her to her boyfriend.

CHAPTER 10

#b99 fic #peraltiago #jake and amy au #newspaper au #life writes its own stories

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berlinaura · 5 years ago

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The trip to Poland was legendary. We had no expectations and no prior information of the whole city before we went so it truly was an adventure. Our first impression was that Szczecin smells like chocolate. Apparently there is a chocolate factory there! The buses reminded me so much of the bus in Harry Potter and he prisoner of Azkaban. I flew towards this elderly lady and judging by the look on her face she said something like “watch out, idiot!”. As I couldn’t say anything other than “sorry!” I said to my friend “we really need to learn some basic polish vocabulary” to which a random passenger offered to teach us “hi” (pronounced: “djen dobre”), “thank you” (pronounced: ”djen kujä”) and “sorry” which ironically I cannot remember how to pronounce.

All of the buses didn’t have a screen which show the next stop and because it was dark, guessing by the surroundings was hard too. We mostly used google maps and tried to guess when is the right time to press stop. We also tried to pay a ticket to the bus driver who then guided us with a “no! machine” to a ticket machine on the back of the bus that only accepted coins (which we did not have). The bus system wasn’t bad though, it was just interesting. Google maps evaluated that he distance of one bus stop we took every day (with a 3,8 km distance!) would take us 6 minutes with a bus. We were there in a minute. Also, the buses ALWAYS came on time to the minute. Szczecin bus drivers are hardcore!

At night we went to a restaurant with good ratings. It took as about an hour to walk there because there seemed to be some kind of obstacle between our hostel and our destination. It was already dark so we had no idea what mine field there is against us so we decided to trust google’s instructions:

At midnight as the restaurant closed and we had completed some intensive drinking we of course forgot about this situation and just started to follow our “gut feeling” of where the hostel is. At first we circulated some company’s yard by walking next to some fence and then ran across railway tracks. Suddenly we realized we are now at some field surrounded by hay that’s taller than us. “Let’s go deeper” we thought and the hay field slowly turned into a forest. My friend started to panic because she felt like we were in a horror movie scene. I tried to think logically “just imagine there’s light here. If this all was happening during daylight, this would be so ridiculous! There’s nothing to worry about!”. A second later I heard noises in the bushes and was SURE there was something in there. A human, a deer, a rat. Suddenly I wanted to get out ASAP.

We started half-running along our path but it turned out to be a dead end. The road led us to an abandoned cottage. Then we saw what had been making noise in the bushes. FREAKING CATS. Their eyes just reflected the light I projected towards them from my almost dying phone. We decided to follow them. They took turns leading us. One cat started jogging along the path, checking every once in a while if we were still following it like some shepherd dog leading its sheep. Then it stood by the road and another cat appeared from the bushes and jogged in front of us. After a while we started hearing car noises and THIS is the moment we realized we were in the area all along that we avoided going to on our way to the restaurant. As we go to the hostel room we laughed our asses off.

The next day we went out for breakfast and I had the best brownie I have ever tasted. We were told that Berliners often go to Szczecin for shopping because the prices are lower than in Germany. To be honest, I noticed the cheap prices only at restaurants, cafes and bars. We went to two shopping centres and he price range was quite usual in my opinion. Mid-shopping we wanted to moist our throats (this does NOT translate well to English but I am using it anyways) so we visited cafe22, a restaurant/bar in the 22nd floor of some fancy building. We were expecting high prices but actually the price range was the same there despite the view. The view wasn’t that nice to be honest. I looked at he city and thought to myself “This is exactly what I thought Poland would look like”. Everything was grey, made out of concrete and/or dilapidated. Cloudy November afternoon sure didn’t do any favors to the view. Nevertheless, it was a place worth going. Fancy atmosphere, strong drinks and cheap prices.

We obviously had to check out Waly Chobergo, a building complex which is probably the most popular attraction in Szczecin. We even saw around 5 tourists there! In the evening we went to a restaurant which served one of the best meals I have ever had. They put seeds an cherry tomatoes into my pasta and it was so delicious I had to buy them and try imitating that dish when I got back to Berlin. After this we started our pub crawl that we ended around 2 in a “film bar”. We realized we have to wait for the bus for 50 minutes so we decided to go to a bar nearby and it turned out to be so cozy! They had this movie theme there, so the lighting was dim like in movie theaters and the seats where old red movie theatre seats. There was a big screen where Kill Bill was playing (without sound but with subtitles). Some people were focusing on the movie while some people just hung out as in a normal bar. I thought that this would be the best place to have a first date in: if you run out things to say, you just look at at the movie and you can even talk while the scene is on! But if you feel like talking and getting to now the person, you can do that without others expecting you to shut up. Such a cute concept. With a good luck, there might even be those in Berlin...

On our last day we went to out for a breakfast again (I was living my best life with my omelette and pancakes!). Quite extempore, we decided to go on a tour to an underground museum afterwards. I had no idea what the tour was about but turned out it was a bomb shelter in the WWII time in Szczecin. It was mind blowing to think that people actually stood where I was standing. The signs on the walls were still there. One of the signs for example forbid gossiping in the bomb shelter. Talking about Hitler’s decisions, about how Germany is doing in the war and/or causing mass hysteria used to be forbidden there and could be punished by even death.

The tour was incredibly interesting! Szczecin used to be a part of Germany that time, and a huge industrial city. The world’s fastest ship of that time for example was manufactured in Szczecin. The city was bombed into ruins during WWII. Being such a industrial city was a big reason why the Allies were interested in attacking it. We had just been spending two days there knowing nothing about the place and its history so after the tour I felt such a Kulturbanause (= someone who just goes to cultural places without wanting to really get to know the place and its culture, only where the mall and bars are). We should have went there on the first day I think. Afterwards we headed back to Berlin, completely drained.

A few weeks later I met a Polish girl here in Berlin and asked her where she was from. When she said she’s from Szczecin and I told her I visited it, her response was “WHY THE HELL”. I don’t know. My question is: why the hell not.

Soon was the time for the first christmas market of the year: Gendanmenmarkt. Me and two friends went there after a Tuesday. I remember studying in the library, almost deciding not to go but went anyways. 1 hour later I was chilling there in the middle of christmas lights, glühwein in my hand (and all over my scarf ahem), dancing to live music that the most random band ever played. I swear they were all high! In this christmas market we started our PICKLE HUNT that lasted almost a month. I visited around 10 different christmas markets this year and at every christmas market the mission was, in addition to chugging glühwein, checking the price of the pickle decorations. We, the pickle bandites, soon noticed that there is no logic in the way Germans price their pickle decorations. Some of them were 3,50€, some 9€. A few days before leaving to Finland for christmas, me and a friend went to the Alexanderplatz christmas market again and finally got our pickles. I already know this will be one of my most valued possessions after coming back.

The chrismas markets also varied in the way people behaved there. We noticed that in the christmas market in Zoologischer garten people were super aggressive and it was guaranteed that someone would bump into you and spill your glühwein all over. The one at Potsdamer platz was not one of the best but that evening escalated to cocktails at Que Pasa. We were originally supposed to just search a bathroom before going home but it just so happened that this goddamn restaurant with its cheap cocktails was the nearest one so of course we had to stay for cocktails. A similar thing happened with Alexanderplatz christmas market (the first time). We decided to go to a “pub” which turned out to be this huge German oktoberfest-like room where people danced on tables and sang Schlagers. My favorite christmas market however was either the first one we visited (Gendanmenmarkt) or the one in Quedlinburg.

In the beginning of December I attended another organized trip like the Dresden one. This time we traveled to Quedlinburg which is a cozy old town in Saxony-Anhalt. The buildings in this city are medieval and therefore the old town is on the UNESCO world heritage list. We had so much fun on this trip with our Wanderlust-squad! We played car games in the bus, shared life trauma and basically made the rest of the bus hate us. In the evening we also visited Magdeburg which was a city that I for a second considered to be my exchange city. I can’t stress enough how grateful I am I did not went there. I mean, the there was nothing wrong with the place. After Berlin it just feels incredibly small.

We decided to go clubbing with the Wanderlust-squad. I am so looking forward to this!

Around this time I also said “fuck it” to school work, downloaded Tinder and started living my best life on tinder dates. I guess I need to censor my text a bit so let’s keep these adventures mysterious.

12.12. there was an international dinner organized by my university. Everybody was supposed to bring traditional food from their home countries and enjoy the christmas feeling with other international students of TU. Me and my swedish friend and her swedish friend who was visiting made potatoes and meatballs. They were super good! But so were the food of the others, I gotta say. This event exceeded my expectations. There was free glühwein, people sang. It was almost like a sittning but at the same time nothing like it. I tasted a Turkish food which was spicy af but I tried my best to keep a straight face. Gotta say that some Swiss chocolate cake was the one that stole my heart.

After this, we decided to continue the evening to a pub. At this point we were at our campus which is in west Berlin (Charlottenburg) so the choice of pubs was quite narrow. We heard a tip from a local though of a bar called “Klo” (=“toilet”) and it sounded so interesting that we just had to check it out. It was one of the weirdest bars I have ever been to! It was like a horror house at an amusement park mixed with humor, toilets and drinks. The wall decorations just started talking out of nowhere. The staff made announcements and sometimes just turned off the lights. At one point our table started going up and down... The list just goes on. I ordered a shot of Cointreau because I remember it being good when I chugged a whole bottle of it on a cruise in August. The bartender asked me if I wanted to have it with ice and I had no idea how people normally drink it (probably not straight from the bottle, the whole bottle in one evening) so I just went with the flow and said yes. “What the actual fuck! Nobody drinks it with ice! What’s wrong with you!” was the answer from the bartender. Mission FAILED. I then asked why they offer ice with it if it is unnatural. “I have to say it. It’s my job. It hurts my soul to ask it”. “Okay, no ice then” I said. The bartender came back with my Cointreau shot and... ONE ICE CUBE. This place was so confusing that it is hard to find words how to describe it. Anyways, the evening was super nice once again and now I feel like I am one experience richer.

Two days later the buddies organized a pub crawl. Me and a friend already had a few glühweins beforehand because we wanted to check out a cozy Markthalle in Kreuzberg (Markthalle Neun) and I have to say that their bio-glühwein is the best glühwein I have tasted so far. It was SWEET AND DELICIOUS. Hopefully Markthalle neun is open in January (and still have glühwein) because I really need to go back there.

When the pub crawl started, the buddies asked ME to lead us to the best pubs. We were at Warschauer Strasse and even though I have heard it is the best place for partying, I had never went out there. We just walked to some direction, a bit away from the main street to find cheaper prices and went into the first pub we found. After drinking a few beers there, we decided to get some wine from Späti and go to a dorm party at Sigmundshof. It is on the other side of Berlin so naturally we had to use the S-bahn trip as efficiently as possible.

On the last week before Christmas I went to Sido’s christmas show in Columbiahalle. I still have no idea how I managed to get this ticket. The show was amazing! He picked up people from the audience to the stage and asked them to sing christmas songs, gave presents to audience, picked people from front row to get drinks from the minibar... There were Casper and SPD as surprise guests. I suprised myself that I still knew the lyrics for “Ne Leiche” even though I listened to it like 4 years ago. I know I hype things so much that it starts to lose meaning but I think this show goes to at least the top 5 things I experienced during this exchange.

My exchange ends 31.3. In 2 days I have spend half of it. For the past few days this has been making me extremely sad. At the same time I want to just make the most of the time I have left but at the same time I really want to do something in order to stay longer. At first I thought about applying for an extent but I really don’t think it is a good idea to study nonstop from October 2019 to May 2021. One of the downsides of doing an exchange study as a master student is that there is really a pressure of graduating and I really worry about getting work experience before I graduate. This is why I now start looking for a job, not extremely efficiently but still applying for even a few jobs here and see if it is possible to spend the spring and summer working here in Berlin. If it doesn’t work out, I will return to Finland to work, cherish the half year I spend here and be forever grateful I ever left.

#berlin #erasmus #exchange

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frighthouseofalighthouse · 5 years ago

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I know it's a lot! But all of the 65 questions you aren't used to!! I love getting to know the blogs I follow!

Okay love! The last one was a freebie so I guess I’ll just leave that one out haha.

1. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you?

Na, usually it’s the opposite for me. I don’t feel important enough to be real.

2. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you?

Maybe a 3? I don’t mind the dark as long as my imagination isn’t getting the best of me, which it usually is. I always have my little touch-activated lamp in my room left on at the dimmest setting at night.

3. The person you would never want to meet?

Donald Trump.

4. What is your favorite word?

Drumonios. It’s an Ancient Greek epithet of Artemis, and it means “haunting the woods.” (hey, no one said English word)

5. If you were a type of tree, what would you be?

*in Monty Python voice* THE LARCH

No, but in all seriousness, I’d be a willow. So gentle and comforting, like the tree leaning over to hug you and give you shade.

6. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought?

Yikes.

7. What shirt are you wearing?

A black shirt with images of moon phases that says “to the moon and back”

8. What do you label yourself as?

Is this a gender/sexual identity question??? Cuz if not I could label myself as anything. But genderwise I’m a cis female and orientation-wise I’m lesbian, biromantic, possibly somewhere on the ace spectrum?

9. Bright room or dark room?

Dark room. Or mostly dark. Dim with a yellowish lamp because I hate white lights.

10. What were you doing at midnight last night?

Talking to my gf on the phone.

11. Favorite age you’ve been so far?

tbh this year, 19. My anxiety’s been better than it ever was. I haven’t been actively suicidal at all this year. I’m just in a better place all around.

12. Who told you they loved you last?

Probably my mom?

13. Your worst enemy?

Myself

14. What is your current desktop picture?

15. Do you like someone?

Romantically? My girlfriend. In general? Everyone who hasn’t crossed me.

16. The last song you listened to?

Right now I’m listening to LA Devotee by Panic! At The Disco :)

17. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up?

Donald Trump, while he’s in a cabinet meeting so it blows up everyone else there too

18. Who would you really like to just punch in the face?

Donald Trump or my ex

19. If anyone could be your slave for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do?

I don’t really want a slave? Kinda against the whole idea? But ig Thomas Jefferson bc he needs to know what it feels like (Hamilton pettiness coming out oops)

20. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional)

My eyes! Idk if I have a picture that shows them really well? But you can check my selfies tag. They’re deep hazel green with gold flecks.

21. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do?

I would look like historical Alexander Hamilton and I would hang out in history museums freaking people out.

22. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it?

Wouldn’t be a secret if I told you. ;) But seriously, I’m not very private about my talents because I’m proud of them. I write, read, make up codes, solve puzzles, sing, do calligraphy. Sometimes my eyeshadow looks decent.

23. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of?

Most of the unique things are PTSD triggers. The rest of my fears are just normal.

24. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal.

Grilled mac and cheese sandwich.

25. You just found $100! How are you going to spend it?

Put it towards saving up for a Switch so I can get the new Pokemon game when it comes out this fall.

26. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go?

The British Isles, where I will do historical tours and live in the Highlands for a year.

27. An angel appears out of Heaven and offers you a lifetime supply of the alcoholic beverage of your choice. “Be brand-specific” it says. Man! What are you gonna say about that? Even if you don’t drink booze there’s something you can figure out… so what’s it gonna be?

I don’t drink, I’m pretty against it in part because my uncle’s a recovering alcoholic, but I’d say strawberry daquiris? Idk brands, man.

28. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place?

Socialism and if you’re gonna mess up the process and turn it into communism then you’re off the island.

29. What is your favorite expletive?

Fuckweasel. Thanks, Raven Cycle.

30. Your house is on fire, holy shit! You have just enough time to run in there and grab ONE inanimate object. Don’t worry, your loved ones and pets have already made it out safely. So what’s the one thing you’re going to save from that blazing inferno?

My phone I guess?

31. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?

Nothing. As much as I hate what I’ve been through (assault by my ex, manipulation by my dad) it’s taught me so much strength and made me who I am. I know red flags. I came out of my shell. I know how to say no, how to cut out toxic family.

32. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world!

Scotland.

33. The Celestial Gates Of Beyond have opened, much to your surprise because you didn’t think such a thing existed. Death appears. As it turns out, Death is actually a pretty cool entity, and happens to be in a fantastic mood. Death offers to return the friend/family-member/person/etc. of your choice to the living world. Who will you bring back?

FDR. We have a polio vaccine and he was my favorite president.

34. What was your last dream about?

I was doing a crossword puzzle but, like, it never ended. And the clues kept changing every time I started to write the answer. It sucked.

35. Are you a good….[insert anything you��d like here]?

Nothing was inserted haha so yes. I am a good.

36. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital?

Twice. Once as a baby for my open heart surgery, and once when I was 4 for severe dehydration from the flu.

37. Have you ever built a snowman?

Yes but it’s been like 13 years.

38. What is the color of your socks?

Light blue and white stripes.

39. What type of music do you like?

Pop, rock, folk, Celtic, classical, old country, like, Woodie Guthrie, and some new country like Kelsea Ballerini.

40. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets?

SUNSETS

41. What is your favorite milkshake flavor?

Cherry!

42. What football team do you support? (I will answer in terms of American football as well as soccer)

Um, I guess the OSU Buckeyes cuz that’s where I live and I hate pro football.

43. Do you have any scars?

I have a huge scar down my chest from my heart surgery, a few self harm scars left, and quite a few from old cat scratches. Also my left knee is covered with scars from being a clumsy child. And I have small birthmarks which correlate to past life injuries which is fun

44. What do you want to be when you graduate?

A librarian/history or English teacher

45. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

My weight.

46. Are you reliable?

Sometimes I flake on plans bc of mental illness, but yes. I am a strong shoulder to lean on, and I will always be there for you.

47. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be?

Am I trying for the right things?

48. Do you hold grudges?

Not consciously. But there are certain things I haven’t been able to forgive just yet.

49. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create?

Sloth dragon. Sloth with little back scales and wings who flies very slowly and breathes fire when threatened.

50. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had?

My mom and I have the funniest conversations. I couldn’t pick one. Every day between us is just hysterical.

51. Are you a good liar?

Yes. But I don’t lie anymore except when I have to.

52. How long could you go without talking?

Probably forever as long as I could write or text.

53. What has been you worst haircut/style?

When I was 9 I decided to get a shoulder length bob. My hair did not approve. Constant white-fro. I don’t have a picture of it full glory, but this is after having it styled, at age 11, as flat as it would go.

54. Have you ever baked your own cake?

Noooo I suck at baking. I’ve made cookies though.

55. Can you do any accents other than your own?

British, I guess? I do a good Hermione.

56. What do you like on your toast?

Butter lmao I’m classic

57. What is the last thing you drew a picture of?

Uhhh I sketched a flower on my church bulletin last week? Nothing fancy. I don’t draw.

58. What would be you dream car?

‘67 Impala baby.

59. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain.

I, uh give political speeches to the showerhead? It’s the Hamilton mood.

60. Do you believe in aliens?

I definitely believe we can’t live in a universe infinitely big all by ourselves.

61. Do you often read your horoscope?

I don’t read my actual horoscope, but I look at those zodiac posts a lot, and I know my full birth chart.

62. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet?

A and S.

63. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons?

Both. Dinsoaurs could have been dragons, we don’t know.

64. What do you think about babies?

They’re okay til they cry or poop or throw up lmao.

Thanks bb!

#a series of essays anonymously published

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